LIBRARY 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

SANTA  BARBARA 


PRESENTED  BY 


HARRY  MCGUIRE 


SOCIAL    THEORY 


BY 

G.  D.  H.  COLE 

FELLOW  OF  MAGDALEN  COLLEGE,  OXFORD 

Author  of  "Self -Government  in  Industry," 
"Labour  in  the  Commonwealth,"  etc. 


NEW  YORK 

FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1920,  by 
FREDERICK  A.  STOKES  COMPANY 


Att  Rights  Reserved 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY  ...  i 

II.  SOME  NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING  .     .  25 

III.  THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FvrrcjTi'm       ...  47 

IV.  THE  FORMS  AND  MOTIVES  OF  ASSOCIATION  63 
V.  THE  STATE 81 

VI.  DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION    .     .  103 

VII.  GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION   .     .     .  117 

VIII.  COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     .     .     .  128 

IX.  THE  ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY  .  144 

X.  REGIONALISM  AND  LOCAL  GOVERNMENT  .  158 

XI.  CHURCHES 172 

XII.  LIBERTY 180 

XIII.  THE  ATROPHY  OF  INSTITUTIONS    .     .     .  193 

XIV.  CONCLUSION 201 

INDEX 215 


SOCIAL  THEORY 

CHAPTER  I 

THE   FORMS   OF   SOCIAL   THEORY 

MEN  do  not  make  communities — they  are 
born  and  bred  into  them.  Every  individual 
at  his  birth  is  flung  into  a  social  environ- 
ment, and  his  life's  work  from  infancy  is  to  make 
the  best  of  that  environment  for  himself  and  for 
his  fellows.  As  he  grows  to  fuller  consciousness, 
his  environment  gradually  expands.  He  becomes 
aware  of  the  family,  contact  with  which  furnishes 
his  first  social  experience.  At  the  same  time,  he 
becomes  aware  also  of  a  larger  world  outside  the 
family,  a  world  of  wisdom,  of  things  seen  from 
windows  and  on  journeys  from  home,  a  world  which 
slowly  assumes  definite  shapes  and  takes  on  human 
characteristics  of  neighborhood  and  similarity.  As 
he  grows  older,  the  fact  of  organization  in  this 
world  becomes  apparent,  and  school,  church,  club 
and  other  social  institutions  claim  him,  and  assume 
a  part  in  his  life.  By  the  time  he  reaches  manhood, 
he  has  drunk  in  and  accepted  the  fact  of  the  world, 
his  environment,  as  a  complex  of  individuals  and 
associations,  of  customs  and  institutions,  of  rights 

1 


2  SOCIAL  THEORY 

and  duties,  of  pleasures,  pains,  desires,  hopes  and 
fears,  strivings  and  attempts  to  understand  all 
centering  round  this  complex  and  all  raising  the 
more  or  less  insistent  question  of  his  place  in  it,  and 
his  relation  to  it. 

Of  course,  this  process  is  widely  different  in  the 
case  of  different  individuals,  types  and  classes. 
Hitherto,  men  have  usually  been  brought  far  sooner 
and  more  completely  into  contact  with  an  organized 
social  environment  than  women,  whose  experi- 
ence has  not  been  allowed  to  expand  with  the  same 
freedom.  Again,  the  opportunities  of  the  rich  and 
of  the  educated  classes  for  contact  with  the  world 
without  have  been  far  fuller  than  those  of  the 
workers  or  of  the  lower  middle  class.  The  workers, 
however,  through  their  Trade  Unions,  clubs  and 
other  societies  have  shared  with  the  upper  classes 
what  is  largely  denied  to  the  lower  middle  class — the 
opportunity  for  free  association  with  a  communal 
object,  and  the  consequent  appreciation  of  the  social 
structure  of  the  world  around  them.  The  Trade 
Union  is  the  working-class  equivalent  for  the  upper- 
class  public  school  and  university,  which  are  the 
scenes  not  so  much  of  education,  as  of  the  social 
training  of  a  ruling  caste. 

The  generality  of  men  and  women  take  their 
experience  of  the  social  scene  around  them  unphilo- 
sophically.  They  do  not  reflect  upon  it;  they 
merely  accept  it.  But  that  does  not  make  it  any 
the  less  a  real  experience,  or  any  the  less  a  part  of 
their  mental  equipment.  They  are  born  into  a 
complex  society,  and  by  a  natural  process  that 
complex  society  becomes  a  part  of  their  lives — as 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY        3 

real  a  Weltanschauung  as  any  Teutonic  philosopher 
ever  imagined. 

The  task  which  I  propose  to  attempt  in  this  book 
is  that  of  setting  down,  as  clearly  as  I  can,  the  social 
content  of  this  Weltanschauung  of  the  ordinary  man, 
not  of  course  limiting  myself  to  what  he  sees,  but 
endeavoring  to  put  together  the  social  contents  of 
various  experiences,  and  to  make  of  them,  as  far  as 
they  form  one,  a  coherent  and  consistent  whole. 
What  is  the  content  of  our  social  experience — what 
is  the  relation  between  the  various  fragmentary 
experiences  and  contacts  of  and  with  individuals, 
associations  and  institutions  which  we  come  upon 
in  our  day-to-day  life  in  Society?  What,  in  short, 
is  the  structure  of  the  half -organized  and  half -con- 
scious community  of  which  we  form  a  part? 

Perhaps  that  last  question  gives  rather  too  large 
and  inclusive  an  idea  of  the  purpose  which  I  have  in 
mind.  It  is  not  all  experience  that  I  mean  to  deal 
with,  but  only  social  experience.  Social  Theory  is 
not  concerned  directly  with  all  the  actions  of  in- 
dividual men,  but  mainly  with  their  actions  taken 
in  concert  through  some  temporary  or  permanent 
organized  group,  and  with  the  actions  of  such  groups 
as  they  affect  and  react  upon  the  individual.  The 
unorganized,  personal  conduct  of  individual  men 
will  be  always  present  as  the  background  of  our 
study,  though  it  will  only  be  treated  incidentally  in 
relation  to  its  social  content. 

Even  with  this  limitation,  the  scope  which  I  have 
taken  for  this  book  will  seem  to  many  people  far 
too  wide.  Social  Theory,  especially  under  its  name 
of  "Political  Theory,"  has  often  been  regarded  as 


4  SOCIAL  THEORY 

having  to  do  mainly  with  one  particular  association, 
the  State,  and  with  its  relation  to  the  individual. 
Recent  theory,  however,  has  been  moving  more 
and  more  to  the  conclusion  that  this  definition  of 
the  scope  of  the  subject  is  wrong,  because  it  is 
fundamentally  untrue  to  the  facts  of  social  ex- 
perience. 

I  do  not  mean,  of  course,  to  deny  that  it  is  possible 
to  write  books  about,  and  even  to  make  a  distinct 
and  separate  study  of,  the  nature  of  the  associ- 
ation called  "The  State,"  and  its  relation  to  the  indi- 
vidual. That  is,  of  course,  a  perfectly  legitimate  and 
necessary  inquiry.  But  I  do  absolutely  deny  that 
any  study  of  the  relations  of  State  and  individual 
can  furnish  even  the  groundwork  for  a  general  sur- 
vey of  social  experience,  and  that  it,  taken  by  itself, 
can  penetrate  to  the  heart  of  the  question  of  man's 
place  in  Society.  It  is  simply  not  true  that  the  social 
relations  of  which  a  man  is  most  directly  and  con- 
stantly aware  are,  under  normal  conditions,  his 
relations  with  the  State ;  and  it  is  still  less  true  that 
these  relations  furnish  the  whole,  or  even  the  greater 
part,  of  his  social  experience. 

Society  is  a  very  complex  thing.  Apart  from 
personal  and  family  relations,  almost  every  indi- 
vidual in  it  has,  from  childhood  onwards,  close  con- 
tacts with  many  diverse  forms  of  social  institution 
and  association.  Not  only  is  he  a  citizen  or  subject 
of  his  State,  and  of  various  local  governing  authori- 
ties within  it:  he  is  also  related  to  the  social  order 
through  many  other  voluntary  or  involuntary 
associations  and  institutions.  He  is,  maybe,  a 
worker  in  a  factory,  mine  or  office,  a  member  of  a 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY        5 

church  or  other  religious  or  irreligious  body,  a 
Trade  Unionist  or  member  of  a  professional  or 
trading  association,  a  Cooperator  or  Allotment 
Holder  or  Building  or  Friendly  Society  member,  he 
has  his  club  of  the  Pall  Mall,  politician  or  workman's 
variety,  he  is  a  sportsman  associated  with  the 
fellow-sportsman,  a  Socialist  or  a  Primrose  Leaguer, 
he  has  hobbies  which  cause  him  to  join  an  associa- 
tion of  persons  with  the  same  tastes,  or  views  which 
cause  him  to  link  up  with  others  of  the  same  opinion. 
Moreover,  as  a  husband  and  a  house  or  share  owner, 
he  is  directly  in  contact  with  the  social  institutions 
of  marriage  and  property,  while  his  whole  life  is  a 
complex  in  which  social  customs  and  traditions  play 
an  immense  part.  None  can  escape  from  constant 
contact  with  some  of  these  various  social  relations, 
and  almost  every  one  is  conscious  of  a  widely  diver- 
sified and  ceaselessly  varying  social  environment  of 
which  he  forms,  for  his  fellows,  a  part.  Custom  is 
perhaps  strongest  among  women,  and  association 
is  certainly  strongest  among  men ;  but  among  women 
also  the  growth  of  association  is  following  hard 
upon  the  awakening  of  a  wider  social  consciousness. 
This  being  the  character  of  the  social  complex, 
the  question  at  once  arises  of  the  right  way  of 
surveying  it  from  the  theoretic  standpoint.  The 
tendency  of  political  theorists  has  been  to  survey  it 
under  the  guidance  of  the  principle  of  Power  or 
Force,  which  is  also  the  principle  of  the  Austinian 
theory  of  law.  Of  all  the  forms  of  association  and 
institution  which  I  have  mentioned,  only  the  State, 
and,  under  the  State,  in  a  small  degree  the  local 
authority,  obviously  possesses  in  our  day  coercive 


6  SOCIAL  THEORY 

power.  The  State,  therefore,  as  the  "determinate 
superior,"  having  in  its  hands  not  only  the  majesty 
of  law,  but  the  ultimate  weapon  of  physical  com- 
pulsion, has  been  singled  out  and  set  on  a  pedestal 
apart  from  all  other  forms  of  association,  and 
treated  as  the  social  institution  par  excellence,  be- 
side which  all  other  associations  are  merely  cor- 
porate or  quasi-corporate  individuals,  which  the 
State  and  the  law  can  only  recognize  at  all  by  pre- 
tending that  they  are  individuals,  although  it  is 
perfectly  plain  that  they  are  not. 

Following  out  this  line  of  thought  to  its  logical 
conclusion,  classical  Political  Theory  has  treated  the 
State  as  the  embodiment  and  representative  of  the 
social  consciousness,  the  State's  actions  as  the 
actions  of  men  in  Society,  the  relations  of  the  State 
and  the  individual  as  the  chief,  and  almost  the  only, 
subject-matter  of  Social  Theory.  Over  against  the 
State  and  its  actions  and  activities  this  form  of 
theory  has  set  indiscriminately  the  whole  complex  of 
individuals  and  other  associations  and  institutions, 
and  has  treated  all  their  manifestations  as  individual 
actions  without  vital  distinction  or  difference. 
""  I  believe  that  this  false  conception  of  the  subject 
arises  mainly  from  the  conception  of  human  society 
in  terms  of  Force  and  Law.  It  begins  at  the  wrong 
end,  with  the  coercion  which  is  applied  to  men  in 
Society,  and  not  with  the  motives  which  hold  men 
together  in  association.  TJi£^otkfix~way ,  of  .con- 
ceiving [human  Society,  first  fully  developed  in 
Rousseau's  Social  Contract,  is  in  terms  not  of  Force 
sor  Law,  buf_jgfj^ijl. 

As  soon  as  we  view  the  social  scene  in  this  light, 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY        7 

the  whole  outlook  is  at  once  different.  Not  only 
the  State,  but  all  the  other  forms  of  association  in 
which  men  join  or  are  joined  together  for  the 
execution  of  any  social  purpose,  are  seen  as  ex- 
pressing and  embodying  in  various  manners  and 
degrees  .the  wills  of  the  individuals  who  compose 
them.  'The  distinction  between  Social  Theory — 
the  theory  of  social  conduct — and  Ethics — the 
theory  of  individual  conduct — is  at  once  seen  to  be 
the  distinction  between  simple  individual  action 
and  associative  action,  between  the  direct  indi- 
vidual action  of  a  human  being  by  the  simple 
translation  of  his  will  into  deed,  and  the  associative 
action  of  a  number  of  human  beings,  or  of  an 
individual  acting  on  behalf  of  a  number  as  agent  or 
representative,  through  a  society  or  association.  / 
Of  course,  the  act  of  an  individual  may  be  just  as 
"social"  in  its  content  and  purpose  as  the  act  of  a 
society  or  group.  But  that  is  not  the  point:  the 
vital  point  is  that,  viewed  in  terms  of  will,  the  actions 
of  the  State  appear  as  of  the  same  nature  with 
the  actions  of  any  other  association  in  which  men 
are  joined  together  for  a  common  purpose.  The 
respective  spheres  of  ethical  and  social  theory  are 
thus  marked  out  with  sufficient  clearness  for  prac- 
tical purposes,  though  a  doubtful  borderland  remains 
of  types  of  action  which  can  be  regarded  as  either 
personal  or  associative,  because  the  element  of 
association,  though  present  in  them,  is  present  in  so 
rudimentary  a  form  as  not  to  override  the  purely 
individual  element.  This  point,  however,  does  not 
concern  us  here ;  for  it  is  enough  for  the  present  to 
have  made  it  clear  that  Social  Theory  is  concerned 


8  SOCIAL  THEORY 

primarily,  not  with  the  State,  but  with  the  whole 
problem  of  human assodjjjon — that  is,  of  associa- 
tive will  and  action. 

It  is,  of  course,  possible  to  reject  will  as  the  basis 
of  human  institutions;  but  the  consequences  of 
such  a  rejection  are  so  extraordinary  that  nearly 
all  political  theorists  have  recoiled  from  their  direct 
acceptance.  Even  those  who,  like  Hobbes,  have 
been  most  assiduous  in  founding  their  conception  of 
actual  societies  on  the  basis  of  Force  and  Law,  have 
sought  to  reinforce  their  position  by  finding  an 
original  basis  for  social  association  in  will.  Hence 
Hobbes'  imaginary  original  social  contract  in  which 
men  bound  themselves  together  by  Will  into  a 
society,  only  to  alienate  forever  for  themselves  and 
their  posterity  the  will  ^  which  alone  could  make 
their  society  legitimate.  /As  soon  as  a  basis  of  right, 
and  not  of  mere  fact,  is  sought  for  human  associa- 
tion, there  is  no  escape  from  invoking  the  principle 
of  human  will,  except  for  those  who  maintain  that 
Kings  are  Kings  forever  by  Divine  Right  and  Ap- 
pointment. And  even  this  is  only  to  appeal  from 
the  Will  of  man  to  an  omnipresent  and  omnipotent 
Will  of  God. 

Every  approach  to  democracy  makes  the  actual 
and  legitimate  foundation  of  Society  on  the  will  of 
its  members  more  manifest.  I  A  theory  based  on 
Force  and  Law  may  pass  for  long  undetected  in  an 
authoritarian  Society;  but  it  cannot  survive  the 
emergence  of  democratic  or  even  of  aristocratic 
consciousness^  This  is  true,  not  only  or  mainly 
because  the"wm  of  the  people  or  of  a  class  begins  to 
exert  its  influence  upon  affairs  of  State;  but,  still 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY        9 

more,  because,  without  the  sanction  of  law,  other 
forms  of  democratic  or  oligarchal  association  begin 
to  exercise  a  power  which,  within  their  sphere  of 
operation,  threatens  to  challenge  or  control  the 
State  and  to  usurp  the  functions  which  it  has 
arrogated  to  itself.  Law  in  the  strict  sense,  law 
enforceable  by  courts  and  police,  may  remain  in  the 
hands  of  the  State;  but  other  bodies,  such  as  a 
baronial  assembly,  a  Church  or  a  Trade  Union, 
frame  regulations  and  secure  their  observance,  even 
without  the  aid  of  the  black  cap  and  the  policeman. 
To  the  great  scandal  of  authority  in  our  own  day, 
even  the  policemen  form  a  Trade  Union  of  their 
own,  and  aim  at  becoming,  within  a  narrow  sphere, 
their  own  legislature,  executive,  and  judiciary. 

Such  a  social  situation  is  fatal  to  Political  Theory 
of  the  old  type.  While  the  political  philosophers 
are  holding  high  argument  about  the  philosophical 
theory  of  the  State,  and  the  relation  to  it  of  the 
individual,  the  world  around  them  has  become 
interested  in  a  new  set  of  problems,  in  the  position 
of  voluntary  and  functional  associations  in  Society, 
in  their  relation  to  national  States,  and  their  position 
as  being  often  international  associations,  in  the 
multiplicity  and  possible  conflict  of  loyalties  and 
obligations  involved  for  the  indi\idual  in  simul- 
taneous membership  of  several  such  associations. 
In  short,  while  the  philosophers  are  still  arguing 
about  the  State  and  the  individual,  the  world  of 
creative  thought  has  moved  on  to  the  discussion 
of  the  functional  organization  of  Society,  and 
the  new  problems  for  the  individual  to  which  it 
gives  rise. 


10  SOCIAL  THEORY 

It  is  not  in  the  least  surprising  that,  under  these 
conditions,  the  political  theory  of  the  schools  has 
become  sterile,  and  that  the  new  developments  have 
arisen  among  those  whose  vital  interest  has  lain 
neither  in  philosophy  nor  in  the  State,  but  in  the 
sphere  of  functional  association.  Apart  from 
purely  psychological  developments,  there  are  at 
present  only  three  live  sources  of  social  theory — the 
Church,  industry  and  history.  Socially  inarticu- 
late in  this  country  since  the  enfeebling  conflicts  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  the  Churches  are  to-day 
regaining  their  voice,  if  not  their  hold,  upon  the 
people.  They  are  beginning  to  realize  that  they,  too, 
are  social  institutions,  and  to  reclaim  their  right  to 
spiritual  self-government  and  spiritual  freedom 
from  the  State.  Dr.  J.  N.  Figgis'  book,  Churches 
in  the  Modern  State,  has  proved  itself  one  of  the 
live  forces  in  present-day  social  theory. 

A  force  far  more  generally  diffused,  and  far  more 
potent  in  its  influence,  is  that  which  springs  from  in- 
dustrial sources.  Bolsheviks,  Syndicalists,  Marxian 
Industrialists  and  Communists  not  merely  claim 
for  proletarian  organizations  independence  of  the 
State ;  they  threaten  to  destroy  it  altogether.  Right 
or  wrong,  they  are  a  force,  and  thejr  doctrines 
are  a  living  international  influence.  /At  the  same 
time  Guild  Socialists,  inspired  also  by  industrial 
and  economic  conditions,  preach  the  doctrine  of 
democratic  self-government  in  industry  and  the 
transformation  of  the  State  by  the  influence  of  the 
functional  principle.  /  Their  doctrine  is  far  wider 
than  industry,  although  it  springs  out  of  industrial 
conditions.  It  amounts  in  the  last  analysis  to  a 


complete  Social  Theory — to  the  Social  Theory  which 
I  am  putting  forward  in  this  book. 

Thirdly,  there  is  the  source  of  history,  which,  as 
our  knowledge  of  the  past  grows,  reminds  us  more 
and  more  that  the  factotum  State — the  omnicom- 
petent,  omnivorous,  omniscient,  omnipresent  Sover- 
eign State — in  so  far  as  it  exists  at  all  outside  the 
brain  of  megalomaniacs,  is  a  thing  of  yesterday,  and 
that  functional  association,  which  is  now  growing 
painfully  to  a  fuller  stature,  is  not  a  young  upstart 
of  our  days,  but  has  a  pedigree  to  the  full  as  long 
and  as  honorable  as  that  of  the  State  itself — and  in- 
deed longer  and  more  honorable.  Not  only  the  study 
of  medieval  history,  but  still  more  the  growing 
knowledge  of  early  human  institutions,  serves  to 
emphasize  the  common  character  of  the  various 
forms  of  human  association,  the  essential  reality, 
based  on  the  common  will  of  men,  of  associations 
to  which  Roman  law  was  prepared  to  concede  only 
the  derivative  character  of  persona  ficta.  We  owe 
much  to  Gierke  and  Maitland  in  the  study  of  law; 
for  they  have  enabled  us  to  view  it,  not  as  the  hand- 
maid of  the  Sovereign  State,  but  in  its  relation  to 
human  association  as  a  whole. 

Our  study  of  Social  Theory  will  begin,  then,  not 
with  tfie  State,  or  with  any  other  particular  form  of 
association,  but  with  association  as  a  whole,  and 
the  way  in  which  men  act  through  associations  in 
supplement  and  complement  to  their  actions  as 
isolated  or  private  individuals. 

Here,  however,  we  are  confronted  with  an  im- 
mediate difficulty.  Is  the  family  to  be  treated  as 
an  association,  and  therefore  as  part  of  the  social 


12  SOCIAL  THEORY 

fabric  of  Society  as  distinguished  from  the  indi- 
viduals composing  it  ?  Does  the  study  of  the  family 
form  a  part  of  the  study  of  individual  conduct  or 
of  social  conduct?  These  are  not  easy  questions 
to  answer. 

I  do  not  propose  to  go  deeply  into  the  historical 
character  of  the  family,  or  to  touch  at  all  upon  the 
relations,  actual  or  supposed,  between  the  family 
and  the  tribe.  I  am  treating  my  subject,  not  his- 
torically, but  purely  in  relation  to  the  present  and 
the  future.  I  shall  therefore  say  only  that,  in 
modern  times,  the  family  has  changed  not  only  its 
nature  and  function,  but  also  its  composition,  and 
that  in  doing  so  it  has  become  far  less  a  social  and 
far  more  a  purely  personal  unit.  The  family  to-day 
only  functions  as  a  unit  in  relation  to  the  personal 
concerns  of  a  relatively  very  small  group,  usually 
those  who  are  included  in  a  single  household  or 
brick-box.  The  family,  in  the  sense  of  the  clan, 
including  a  large  group  of  blood  kindred,  no 
longer  survives  in  Western  Countries  as  a  social 
unit.  It  was,  in  primitive  civilization,  distinctly 
and  markedly  a  social  rather  than  a  personal  unit; 
but  to-day  the  social  functions  of  the  clan  have 
passed  into  other  hands,  and  the  family  remains 
as  a  private  group  largely  bereft  of  social  functions 
except  in  the  getting  and  upbringing  of  children. 
No  small  exception,  truly!  But  it  is  an  exception 
largely  irrelevant  to  our  present  purposes.  For, 
although  in  a  sense  the  family  is  the  necessary  basis 
of  Society,  it  remains  itself,  under  modern  condi- 
tions, largely  external  to  the  social  fabric,  the  scene 
of  purely  personal  contacts,  and  least  capable  of 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      13 

organization  where  it  is  most  performing  a  social 
function.  Its  very  character  is  to  be  unorganizable, 
incapable  of  organized  coordination  with  the  world 
of  associations  which  surrounds  it;  in  short,  per- 
sonal rather  than  collective,  individual  rather  than 
associative  in  its  operation.  It  is  itself  perhaps  the 
strongest  of  all  human  groups,  as  it  is  certainly  the 
most  permanent ;  but,  as  a  human  group,  it  is  essen- 
tially individual,  and  not  the  least  of  its  strength 
lies  in  the  fact  that  it  holds  aloof  from  other  groups 
and  remains,  to  a  great  extent,  isolated  in  a  world 
of  developing  interrelation.  Its  members  exercise 
their  civic,  industrial  and  political  functions  more 
and  more,  not  through  it,  but  as  individuals,  and, 
by  the  removal  of  other  past  functions,  the  disap- 
pearance of  domestic  industry  for  instance,  it  is 
more  and  more  set  free  to  become  the  sphere  of 
purely  personal  affections  and  contacts. 

In  the  past,  some  social  theorists  have  based  their 
whole  theory  upon  the  analogy  of  the  family,  and 
have  striven  to  explain  all  wider  phenomena  of 
association  and  community  in  its  light.1  Any  such 
explanation  seems  to-day  so  obviously  misleading 
that  it  need  not  detain  us  at  all.  It  is,  however, 
important  to  point  out  that  this  is  by  no  means  the 
only  cure  in  which  the  use  of  a  false  analogy  has 
caused  social  theories  to  suffer  shipwreck.  Again 
and  again,  social  theorists,  instead  of  finding  and 
steadily  employing  a  method  and  a  terminology 
proper  to  their  subject,  have  attempted  to  express 
the  facts  and  values  of  Society  in  terms  of  some 
other  theory  or  science.  On  the  analogy  of  the 
1  e.g.  Filmer's  Patriarcha. 


14  SOCIAL  THEORY 

physical  sciences  they  have  striven  to  analyze  and 
explain  Society  as  mechanism,  on  the  analogy  of 
biology  they  have  insisted  on  regarding  it  as  an 
organism,  on  the  analogy  of  mental  science  or 
philosophy  they  have  persisted  in  treating  it  as  a 
person,  sometimes  on  the  religious  analogy  they 
have  come  near  to  confusing  it  with  a  God. 

These  various  analogies  have  very  different  de- 
grees of  value  and  disvalue.  The  mechanical  anal- 
ogy and  the  organic  analogy  have  been  alike  defi- 
nitely harmful,  and  have  led  theory  seriously  astray; 
for  they  both  invoke  a  material  analogy  in  what  is 
essentially  a  mental  or  spiritual  study.  The  anal- 
ogies drawn  from  psychology  and  mental  philosophy 
are  far  less  harmful,  and  may  be  even  extremely 
suggestive,  if  they  are  not  pushed  too  far;  for 
though  neither  Society  nor  the  various  associations 
which  it  includes  are  "persons,"  they  approach  far 
more  nearly  to  being  persons  than  to  being  either 
mechanical  or  organic. 

There  are,  however,  obvious  and  sufficient  reasons 
why  no  analogy  can  carry  the  study  of  human 
Society  very  far  forward.  To  every  distinct  human 
study  corresponds  its  own  method  and  its  own 
terminology,  and  analogy  pushed  beyond  very 
restricted  limits  necessarily  engenders  confusion. 
Our  object  is  not  to  know  what  Society  is  like,  but 
to  know  what  and  how  it  is ;  and  any  reference  of  it 
to  some  other  body  of  knowledge  defeats  the  object 
in  view. 

It  is  true  that  the  method  of  social  theory  bears 
a  close  resemblance  to  the  method  of  ethics  and 
psychology.  The  two  are,  indeed,  in  a  very  real 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      15 

sense,  complementary,  and  only  in  both  groups  of 
knowledge  together  can  we  find  a  full  knowledge  of 
community.  They  must  pursue  to  a  great  extent  the 
same  method,  in  order  to  arrive  at  conclusions  which 
are  capable  of  being  collated  and  correlated.  Thus 
social  theory  has  its  social  psychology,  its  descriptive 
study  of  the  action  of  men  in  association,  and  this  is 
related  to  social  philosophy  to  some  extent,  though 
not  wholly  in  the  same  way  as  individual  psychol- 
ogy is  related  to  moral  philosophy.1  How  far 
the  parallel  holds  depends  largely  upon  the  sphere 
assigned  to  social  psychology,  which  is  a  young 
science  not  yet  at  all  sure  of  its  scope  or  method. 

The  fact,  however,  that  social  and  moral  theory 
are  complementary,  and  that,  as  the  final  object  of 
both  is  the  human  mind  in  action,  they  must  pursue 
largely  and  essentially  the  same  method,  is  only 
one  reason  the  more  for  keeping  their  terminologies 
as  clearly  distinct  as  possible.  For  their  spheres  of 
operation  are  distinct,  though  closely  related,  and 
the  closeness  of  their  relationship  only  makes  any 
confusion  of  terminology  the  more  likely  to  result 
in  confusion  of  thought.  Thus,  if  we  say  that  an 
association  is  a  "person,"  we  are  merely  obscuring 
a  difference — between  persons  and  associations,  or 
rather  between  personal  and  associative  action,  upon 
which  the  separate  existence  of  moral  and  social 
theory  essentially  depends.  Such  a  conception  may 
be  useful  to  lawyers  whose  object  is  to  be  able  to 
group  persons  and  associations  together  for  like 
treatment  civilly  under  the  law;  but  it  is  clearly 
inadmissible  in  social  theory. 

*To  this  point  I  must  return  later.    See  p.  18. 


16  SOCIAL  THEORY 

We  must,  then,  avoid  analogies,  or  at  the  least 
avoid  allowing  our  terminology  to  be  influenced  at 
all  by  analogies,  however  valuable.  We  must  adopt 
our  own  terminology,  and  make  it,  as  far  as  possible, 
clearly  distinct  from  the  terminology  of  any  other 
study. 

So  far,  I  am  fully  aware,  the  ground  has  not  been 
cleared  for  the  adoption  of  an  easily  intelligible  and 
consistent  terminology  for  social  theory.  This  is  in 
part,  but  only  in  part,  the  fault  of  social  theorists, 
who  have  not  succeeded  in  denning  with  sufficient 
exactitude  the  scope  and  the  boundaries  of  their 
inquiry.  It  must,  however,  be  recognized  that  the 
task  is  one  of  peculiar  difficulty,  both  because  the 
words  of  social  theory  are  words  of  common  use  and 
wont,  and  therefore  peculiarly  liable  to  shift  their 
meaning  as  conditions  change,  and  still  more  because 
conditions  do  change,  and  the  associations  and  in- 
stitutions with  which  social  theory  hals  to  deal 
change  with  them,  develop  new  functions,  and  dis- 
card old  ones,  and  even  alter  their  fundamental 
character  and  internal  structure.  The  "States"  of 
to-day  differ  widely  among  themselves,  and  we 
should  be  hard  put  to  it  to  find  a  definition  which 
would  embrace  them  all.  But  the  "States"  of  differ- 
ent ages  differ  far  more  widely,  until  such  common 
nature  as  exists  among  them  is  almost  undiscernible 
in  the  mass  of  transient  characteristics  which  en- 
compass them  at  every  time. 

If,  then,  this  book  seems  to  be  concerned  largely 
with  questions  of  terminology,  that  is  not  my  fault. 
It  is  hardly  possible  to  fall  into  any  discussion  upon 
an  important  point  of  social  theory  without  finding 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      17 

sooner  or  later  the  discussion  tending  to  resolve 
itself  into  a  question  of  words — not  because  only 
words  are  at  issue,  but  because  it  is  impossible  to 
get  down  to  the  real  issues  until  verbal  ambiguities 
have  been  removed.  We  shall  be  unable  to  proceed 
with  any  analysis  and  social  phenomena,  and  still 
more  with  any  explanation  of  them,  until  we  have  de- 
termined, as  far  as  possible,  to  use  each  important 
name  only  in  a  single  and  definite  sense,  and  until 
we  have  agreed  what  that  definite  sense  is  to  be. 
That  is  why  my  second  chapter  deals  entirely  with 
questions  of  terminology. 

Before,  however,  we  begin  the  discussion  of  these 
vexed  questions,  it  will  be  well  to  make  as  plain  as 
possible  the  object  which  this  book  has  in  view. 
The  subject-matter  of  social  theory  is  the  action  of 
men  in  association.  That  is  clear  enough.  But 
manifestly  this  subject-matter  can  be  studied  from 
several  different  points  of  view.  Apart  from  purely 
historical  studies,  there  are  at  least  three  main 
ways — besides  many  subsidiary  ways — of  approach- 
ing it,  and,  while  each  of  the  resulting  bodies  of 
knowledge  is  useful  to  each  of  the  others,  and  each 
throws  a  necessary  light  upon  each,  their  respective 
interests  are  clearly  distinct  and  the  generalizations 
or  results  with  which  they  are  concerned  are  essen- 
tially different.  We  must  see  clearly  what  is  the 
content  of  these  various  studies,  if  we  are  to  recog- 
nize and  appreciate  the  scope  and  the  limitations  of 
that  study  with  which  alone  we  are  here  directly 
concerned. 

The  first  way  of  approach  to  social  theory  lies 
through  the  study  and  comparison  of  actual  social 


18  SOCIAL  THEORY 

institutions.  Here  it  often  approaches  nearly  to 
history ;  for  the  direct  material  with  which  it  works 
is  to  be  found  in  history.  The  anthropologist  or 
sociologist,  studying  the  institutions  of  primitive 
mankind,  the  constitutional  historian,  studying  the 
evolution  of  the  State  and  of  the  political  structure 
of  Society,  the  jurist,  studying  the  development  of 
law,  the  ecclesiastical  historian,  studying  the  growth 
and  organization  of  churches — all  these  amass 
materials  from  which  generalizations  can  be  drawn, 
and  on  which  more  or  less  scientific  principles  of 
human  organization  can  be  based.  The  student  of 
representative  institutions — a  Montesquieu  or  an 
Ostrogorski — works  upon  these  materials  and  ar- 
rives at  results  which  possess  an  objective  value.  A 
"positive  science"  of  institutions  is  the  object  of 
such  forms  of  inquiry. 

The  second  way  of  approach  lies  through  the 
study,  not  of  institutions  in  themselves,  but  of  the 
motives  and  impulses  by  which  men  are  moved  in 
their  social  actions  through  institutions  and  associa- 
tions. At  one  extreme,  this  type  of  theory  finds  its 
place  in  the  study  of  "mob"  or  "crowd"  psychol- 
ogy, the  impulses  and  ways  of  action  of  a  barely 
organized  human  group.  At  the  other  extreme,  it 
studies,  from  the  same  standpoint,  the  psychological 
aspects  of  the  most  complicated  and  highly  devel- 
oped form  of  social  association,  and  endeavors,  like 
the  psychology  of  individual  conduct,  to  formulate 
the  general  rules  which  guide  the  actions  of  men  in 
association,  studying  also  the  diseases  of  association 
as  individual  psychology  studies  the  diseases  of 
personality.  Mr.  Robert  Michels'  book  on  Democ- 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      19 

racy  and  the  Organisation  of  Political  Parties  is 
perhaps  the  best  modern  example  of  this  form  of 
study  in  its  developed  form;  but  the  nucleus  of  it 
is  to  be  found  in  that  part  of  Rousseau's  Social 
Contract  which  deals  with  the  actions  of  "govern- 
ment," and  the  tendency  of  all  governments  to  de- 
generate.1 

There  is,  of  course,  much  "Social  Psychology" 
which  takes  for  itself  a  far  more  roving  commission 
than  this.  Like  psychology  as  a  whole,  Social 
Psychology  has  often  tended,  in  the  hands  of  its 
professors,  to  rely  too  much  on  data  afforded  by  the 
primitive  types,  and  to  resolve  itself  largely  into  an 
analysis  of  instincts.  Mr.  Graham  Wallas'  Human 
Nature  in  Politics  furnished  a  sort  of  preface  to  a 
more  developed  sort  of  Social  Psychology,  which  its 
author  proceeded  to  follow  up,  somewhat  disap- 
pointingly, in  The  Great  Society.  In  America,  how- 
ever, the  method  of  Mr.  Wallas  is  finding  followers 
in  plenty,  and  big  developments  of  this  form  of 
social  study  may  be  expected  from  these  sources. 

The  third  way  of  approach  to  social  theory  is 
that  which  Rousseau  explicitly  set  out  to  attempt  in 
the  first  two  books  of  his  Social  Contract.  It  is  no 
less  than  the  discovery  of  universal  principles  of 
social  association — of  the  values,  rather  than  of  the 
facts — of  sociality.  He  contrasted  his  own  method 
sharply  with  that  of  Montesquieu  in  the  following 
passage : — 

"Montesquieu  did  not  intend  to  treat  of  the 

principles  of  political  right;  he  was  content  to 

treat  of  the  positive  law  of  established  govern- 
1  See  Social  Contract,  bk.  iii.,  especially  chap,  x. 


20  SOCIAL  THEORY 

ments ;  and  no  two  studies  could  be  more  different 

than  these."1 

Thus,  in  Rousseau's  view,  the  way  of  approach 
which  he  sought  to  adopt  in  discovering  the  philo- 
sophic principles  of  human  association  was  a  way 
which  concerned  itself  not  with  fact,  but  with  right. 
It  was,  in  the  language  of  the  schools,  a  normative, 
and  not  a  positive  study.  It  was  thus  complemen- 
tary and  parallel  to  ethical  philosophy  as  the  study 
of  individual  conduct  from  the  moral  standpoint, 
just  as  social  psychology,  the  study  of  associative 
conduct  from  the  descriptive,  analytical  and  com- 
parative point  of  view,  corresponds  to  individual 
psychology,  as  the  study  of  individual  conduct  from 
the  same  point  of  view.  Here,  however,  the  parallel 
breaks  down  because  of  the  difference  of  subject 
matter.  In  the  case  of  social  institutions,  there  is 
a  third  way  of  study — the  first  of  those  mentioned 
above — which  examines  and  compares  actual  in- 
stitutions and  endeavors  to  reach  practical  general- 
izations on  this  basis.  In  the  case  of  individual 
conduct,  there  is  no  corresponding  third  way,  unless 
we  consent  to  regard  the  study  of  the  human  body — 
physiological  psychology,  physiology  proper,  and 
all  the  other  sciences  which  have  to  do  with  the  body 
— as  in  some  sense  parallel.  But  to  do  this  is  to 
fall  into  one  of  those  dangerous  analogies  against 
which  we  have  already  uttered  a  warning.  Actual 
institutions  may  be  likened,  in  a  certain  sense,  to  the 
"body"  of  the  community,  as  they  may  be  re- 

1  Emile,  bk.  v.  The  word  droit  in  the  French  is  used  in  the 
sense  both  of  "right"  (droit  politique)  and  "law"  (droit 
positif). 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      21 

garded  as,  in  a  certain  sense,  its  mechanism.  But 
strictly  speaking,  the  community  has  no  body  and, 
as  Herbert  Spencer  said,  no  "common  sensor  him." 
Institutions,  even  if  we  abstract  from  the  motives 
which  are  present  in  their  action,  are  neither 
organism  nor  mechanism.  We  may,  if  we  will, 
speak  of  the  "organs  of  the  body  social,"  or  of  the 
"machinery  of  Society,"  but  we  must  beware  of 
regarding  such  phrases  as  more  than  metaphors,  or 
of  basing  any  conclusions  at  all  upon  them. 

My  object  in  this  book  is  primarily  philosophical. 
I  am  concerned  principally  with  social  theory  as  the 
social  complement  of  ethics,  with  "ought"  rather 
than  with  "is,"  with  questions  of  right  rather  than 
of  fact.  But  this  does  not  mean  that  it  is  desirable 
or  possible  to  extrude  from  consideration  the  other 
forms  of  social  study  which  have  been  mentioned. 
Social  psychology  of  the  type  described  above  offers, 
in  particular,  indispensable  material  for  any  study 
of  social  conduct.  The  difference  is  that,  in  relation 
to  the  particular  inquiry  upon  which  we  are  setting 
out,  it  forms  part,  not  of  the  ultimate  interest  or 
object  before  us,  but  of  the  material  on  which  we 
have  to  work.  We  must  know  how  associations  and 
institutions  actually  work,  what  human  motives  and 
distortions  of  human  motive  are  actually  present  in 
them,  before  we  can  form  any  philosophical  concep- 
tion of  the  principles  on  which  they  rest.  We  there- 
fore cannot  quite  say,  like  Rousseau,  "Away  with 
all  the  facts !"  although  in  our  conclusions  the  facts 
drop  away  and  only  questions  of  right  remain. 

There  is  a  further  danger,  not  yet  directly  men- 
tioned, against  which  we  must  be,  throughout  the 


22  SOCIAL  THEORY 

study,  always  on  our  guard.  It  is  the  more  neces- 
sary to  guard  against  it,  because  the  essential  diffi- 
culties of  terminology  are  always  drawing  us  into 
it,  whether  we  will  or  not.  We  must  avoid  thinking 
of  either  the  State  or  the  community  as  ends  in 
themselves,  as  self-subsistent  and  individual  realities 
similar  to,  or  greater  than,  the  persons  who  are 
members  of  them.  We  must  never  say  that  the 
State  desires  this,  or  the  community  wills  that,  or 
the  Church  is  aiming  at  so  and  so,  without  realizing 
clearly  that  the  only  wills  that  really  exist  are  the 
wills  of  the  individual  human  beings  who  have 
become  members  of  these  bodies.  There  is  no 
such  thing,  strictly  speaking,  as  the  "will"  of  an 
association  or  institution;  there  are  only  the 
cooperating  wills  of  its  members. 

The  chief  difficulty  here  arises  from  two 
sources.  First,  from  the  fact  that  the  actions  of  an 
association  seldom  if  ever  reflect  the  wills  of  all  its 
members — there  is  practically  always  a  dissentient 
minority,  and  very  often  an  apathetic  majority.  Sec- 
ondly, from  the  fact  that  an  association  often  seems 
to  acquire  a  sort  of  momentum  which  impels  it  into 
action  without  the  force  of  any  individual  will 
behind  it,  or  at  least  causes  big  actions  to  be  taken 
on  a  very  small  and  weak  basis  of  will.  Both  these 
facts  easily  lead  us  to  ascribe  a  will  to  the  institution 
itself — a  will  in  some  sense  transcending  the  wills  of 
its  members.  Burke's  French  Revolution  arrives  at 
this  position  by  the  second  route;  Bosanquet's 
Philosophical  Theory  of  the  State  and  much  other 
more  or  less  Hegelian  writing  by  the  first.  Rous- 
seau sometimes  seems  to  fall  into  the  same 


THE  FORMS  OF  SOCIAL  THEORY      23 

error,  though  his  way  of  arriving  at  it  is  more 
obscure. 

This  is  a  question  which  will  have  to  be  discussed 
much  more  fully  later  in  this  book.  Here  it  need 
only  be  said  that,  even  if  the  belief  underlying  the 
view  of  State  or  community  or  association  as  an 
"end  in  itself"  were  true,  it  would  be  none  the  less 
important  to  keep  our  ways  of  speaking  about  such 
"ends  in  themselves"  clearly  distinct  from  our  ways 
of  speaking  about  individual  human  beings.  Other- 
wise, only  serious  confusion  can  result.  Thus,  if, 
like  Rousseau,  we  use  the  term  "General  Will"  to 
mean  sometimes  a  will  generally  diffused  among  the 
citizens,  and  at  other  times  to  mean  a  will  whose 
object  is  the  general  good  of  the  citizens,  whether 
it  is  present  in  the  mind  of  one  or  some  or  all  of 
them,  the  way  is  already  paved  to  an  illusory  recon- 
ciliation of  these  two  different  meanings  of  terming 
this  "General  Will,"  which  begins  in  either  case  as 
somebody's  (or  everybody's)  will,  into  a  will  which 
is  neither  somebody's  nor  everybody's,  but  the  will 
of  the  State  or  the  community  itself. 

I  have  spoken  so  much  of  terminological  difficul- 
ties and  confusions  that  I  fear  the  reader  is  already 
looking  forward  to  the  next  chapter,  which  deals 
entirely  with  the  use  of  terms,  with  considerable 
misgivings.  But  I  hope  I  have  said  enough  to  make 
it  plain  that  there  is  no  chance  of  carrying  this 
inquiry  satisfactorily  through  to  the  end  unless  we 
begin  by  getting  as  clear  as  we  can  the  sense  in 
which  the  names  on  which  it  hinges  are  to  be  used. 
We  cannot  hope  to  get  them  quite  clear,  even  to  our 
own  minds;  and  still  less  can  we  hope  to  find  any 


24  SOCIAL  THEORY 

way  of  reconciling  or  making  easily  comparable  the 
varying  terminologies  of  different  writers  on  our 
subject.  But  we  must  do  the  best  we  can,  and  crave 
indulgence  if  our  definitions  are  not  fully  satis- 
factory. 

To  that  task  of  clearing  the  ground  for  our  main 
inquiry  we  must  now  turn. 


CHAPTER  II 

SOME  NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING 

EVERY    developed    Community    may    be   re- 
garded as  giving  rise  to  an  organized  Society, 
within  which  there  exists  a  vast  complex  of 
social  customs,  institutions  and  associations,  through 
which  the  members  or  citizens  express  themselves 
and  secure  in  part  the  fulfillment  of  the  various 
purposes  which  some  or  all  of  them  have  in  com- 
mon.   There  are  in  this  sentence  at  least  seven  words 
upon  the  clear  definition  of  which  success  in  our 
subsequent  inquiry  largely  depends. 

Community  is  the  broadest  and  most  inclusive  of 
the  words  which  we  have  to  define.  By  a  "Com- 
munity" I  mean  a  complex  of  social  life,  a  complex 
including  a  number  of  human  beings  living  together 
under  conditions  of  social  relationship,  bound  to- 
gether by  a  common,  however  constantly  changing, 
stock  of  conventions,  customs  and  traditions,  and 
conscious  to  some  extent  of  common  social  objects 
and  interests.  It  will  be  seen  at  once  that  this  is  a 
very  wide  and  elastic  form  of  definition  under  which 
a  wide  variety  of  social  groups  might  be  included. 
It  is,  indeed,  of  the  essence  of  community  that  its 
definition  should  be  thus  elastic;  for  "community" 

25 


26  SOCIAL  THEORY 

is  essentially  a  subjective  term,  and  the  reality  of  it 
consists  in  the  consciousness  of  it  among  its  mem- 
bers. Thus  a  family  is,  or  may  be,  a  community, 
and  any  group  which  is,  in  a  certain  degree,  self- 
contained  and  self-subsistent,  is  or  may  be  a  commu- 
nity. A  medieval  University,  a  monastic  brother- 
hood, a  cooperative  colony — these  and  many  more 
may  possess  those  elements  of  social  comprehensive- 
ness which  give  a  right  to  the  title  of  community. 

But,  if  the  word  is  wide  and  inclusive  enough  in 
one  aspect,  it  is  essentially  limiting  in  another.  In 
order  to  be  a  community,  a  group  must  exist  for  the 
good  life  and  not  merely  for  the  furtherance  of  some 
specific  and  partial  purpose.  Thus,  a  cricket  club, 
or  a  Trade  Union,  or  a  political  party  is  not  a  com- 
munity, because  it  is  not  a  self-contained  group  of 
complete  human  beings,  but  an  association  formed 
for  the  furtherance  of  a  particular  interest  common 
to  a  number  of  persons  who  have  other  interests 
outside  it.  A  community  is  thus  essentially  a  social 
unit  or  group  to  which  human  beings  belong,  as 
distinguished  from  an  association  with  which  they 
are  only  connected. 

Yet,  despite  this  wholeness  and  universality 
which  are  of  the  nature  of  community,  it  is  not  the 
case  that  a  man  can  belong  to  one  community  only. 
A  community  is  an  inclusive  circle  of  social  life;  but 
round  many  narrow  circles  of  family  may  be  drawn 
the  wider  circle  of  the  city,  and  round  many  circles 
of  city  the  yet  wider  circle  of  the  Province  or  the 
Nation,  while  round  all  the  circles  of  Nation  is 
drawn  the  yet  wider  and  more  cosmopolitan  circle  of 
World  civilization  itself.  No  one  of  these  wider 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING        27 

circles  necessarily  absorbs  the  narrower  circles 
within  it:  they  may  maintain  themselves  as  real 
and  inclusive  centers  of  social  life  within  the  wider 
communities  beyond  them.  A  man  is  not  less  a 
member  of  his  family  or  a  citizen  of  his  city  for 
being  an  Englishman  or  a  cosmopolitan.  Member- 
ship of  two  communities  may  lead,  for  the  indir 
vidual,  to  a  real  conflict  of  loyalties ;  but  the  reality 
of  the  conflict  only  serves  to  measure  the  reality  of 
the  communal  obligation  involved. 

Our  definition  does  not,  of  course,  enable  us  to 
say  exactly  and  in  every  instance  what  is  a  com- 
munity and  what  is  not.  Being  a  community  is  a 
matter  of  degree,  and  all  communities,  being  actual, 
are  also  necessarily  imperfect  and  incomplete. 
There  may  often  arise,  not  merely  a  dispute,  but  an 
actual  doubt  in  the  minds  of  .the  persons  concerned 
to  what  community  they  belong,  as  for  instance  in 
a  border  country  which  hardly  knows  with  which  of 
the  peoples  it  lies  between  its  community  of  tradi- 
tion, interest  and  feeling  is  the  stronger.  Again,  a 
province  or  a  town  may  be  merely  an  administrative 
area,  with  no  common  life  or  feeling  of  its  own,  or 
it  may  be  a  real  and  inclusive  center  of  social  life. 
Moreover,  it  may  pass  by  insensible  stages  from  the 
one  condition  to  the  other,  as  when  a  depopulated 
strip  of  countryside  becomes  first  a  formless  urban 
district  and  then  gradually  assumes  the  form  and 
feeling  of  a  town  or  city,  changes  and  developments 
in  administrative  organization  usually,  but  not 
necessarily,  accompanying  the  change  in  feeling. 
There  are  groups  which  obviously  deserve  the  name 
of  communities,  and  groups  which  obviously  do  not 


28  SOCIAL  THEORY 

deserve  it;  but  there  are  also  countless  groups  of 
which  it  is  difficult  to  say,  at  any  particular  moment, 
whether  they  deserve  the  name  or  not. 

It  is  plain,  then,  that  our  thing,  "a  community," 
does  not  necessarily  involve  any  particular  form  of 
social  organization,  or  indeed  any  social  organiza- 
tion at  all.  It  is  not  an  institution  or  a  formal  asso- 
ciation, but[a  center  of  feeling,  a  group  felt  by  its 
members  to  be  a  real  and  operative  unity,!  In  any 
community  larger  than  the  family,  however,  this 
feeling  of  unity,  with  its  accompanying  need  for 
common  action,  almost  necessarily  involves  con- 
scious and  formal  organization.  The  feeling  of 
unity  makes  it  easy  for  the  members  of  a  commu- 
nity to  associate  themselves  together  for  the  various 
purposes  which  they  have  in  common,  and,  where 
the  community  is  free  from  external  hindrances, 
such  association  surely  arises  and  is  devoted  to  the 
execution  of  these  common  purposes.  Where  a  com- 
munity is  not  free,  and  an  external  power  hinders  or 
attempts  to  prevent  organization,  association  still 
asserts  itself,  but  instead  of  directing  itself  to  the 
fulfillment  of  the  various  social  needs  of  the  group, 
almost  every  association  is  diverted  to  subserve  the 
task  of  emancipating  the  community  from  external 
hindrances.  This,  for  instance,  is  the  position  in 
Ireland  at  the  present  time. 

We  are  concerned  in  this  "study  with  community 
as  a  whole,  and  with  communities  of  every  kind; 
but  our  chief  interest  is  necessarily  with  those  larger 
and  more  complex  communities  which  have  the 
largest  social  content  and  the  most  diversified  social 
organization.  It  is,  indeed,  in  relation  to  these  that 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING         29 

the  principal  difficulties  arise.  The  simple  fact  of 
community  is  easy  enough  to  appreciate;  but  in  a 
large  and  highly  developed  social  group,  internal 
organization,  and  cross-currents  of  organization 
which,  assignable  to  wider  communities,  overleap 
the  frontiers  of  the  smaller  groups  and  communities 
within  them,  often  loom  so  large  that  the  fact  of 
community  itself  tends  to  disappear  from  sight. 
The  desire  to  counter  this  tendency  is,  as  we  shall 
see  later,  one  of  the  principal  causes  of  the  facile, 
but  fatal,  identification  of  community  with  "State" 
which  is  so  often  made  by  social  theorists. 

"Every  developed  community,"  we  began  by 
declaring,  "may  be  regarded  as  giving  rise  to  an 
organized  Society."  In  the  small  community  of  the 
family  this  distinction  does  not  to-day,  or  usually, 
arise.1  But  for  larger  communities  the  distinction 
is  of  vital  importance.  In  every  such  community 
there  is  a  part  of  the  common  life  which  is  definitely 
and  formally  organized,  regulated  by  laws  and 
directed  by  associations  formed  for  social  purposes. 
I  mean  to  use  the  term  Society  to  denote  the  com-, 
plex  of  organized  associations  and  institutions 
within  the  community. 

I  am  conscious  in  this  use  of  giving  to  the  word  • 
"Society"  a  more  definite  meaning  than  those  with 
w*hich  it  is  customarily  employed.  Indeed,  the 
meaning  here  assigned  to  it  is  to  a  certain  extent 
artificial,  but  by  no  means  entirely  so.  We  do  in 
fact  constantly  speak  of  Society  when  we  wish  to 

1  It  does  arise  wherever,  as  in  tribal  communities,  the  family 
becomes  a  center  of  organized  law-giving  or  justice,  or  directs 
the  economic  life  of  its  members  on  a  wide  enough  basis  to  re- 
quire formal  organization. 


80  SOCIAL  THEORY 

denote  neither  the  whole  complex  of  community, 
nor  any  particular  association  or  institution,  but 
the  sum  total  of  organized  social  structure  which  is 
the  resultant  of  the  various  associations  and  insti- 
tutions within  a  community.  A  word  is  necessary 
for  our  purposes  to  express  our  sense  of  that  part  of 
the  common  life  which  is  organized,  and  the  word 
"Society"  seems  the  best  fitted  for  this  purpose. 

"Society,"  then,  in  the  sense  in  which  the  word 
is  used  in  this  book,  is  not  a  complete  circle  of  social 
life,  or  a  social  group  of  human  beings,  but  a  result- 
ant of  the  interaction  and  complementary  character 
of  the  various  functional  associations  and  institu- 
tions. Its  concern  is  solely  with  the  organized  co- 
operation of  human  beings,  and  its  development 
consists  not  directly  in  the  feeling  of  community 
among  individuals,  but  in  the  better  coherence  and 
more  Jiarmonious  relationship  of  the  various  func- 
tional bodies  w'ithin  the  community. 

We  have  seen  that  a  developed  community,  larger 
than  the  family,  can  hardly  exist  without  institutions 
and  associations;  that  is,  without  Society.  Society, 
on  the  other  hand,  may  exist,  if  imperfectly,  yet  in  a 
developed  form,  without  real  community,  or  with 
only  a  very  slender  basis  of  community.  The  union 
of  Ireland  and  Great  Britain  under  a  single  Parlia- 
ment, and  with  a  large  system  of  associations  and 
institutions  extending  to  both,  is  an  instance  of  a 
Society  with  but  the  shadow  of  a  basis  of  commu- 
nity. In  such  a  case,  as  we  shall  see,  the  more  artifi- 
cial an  association  or  institution  is,  or  the  greater 
the  element  of  coercion  it  includes,  the  more  it  is  in- 
clined to  persist,  whereas  the  more  voluntary  and 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING        31 

spontaneous  forms  of  organization  find  it  hard  to 
live  under  such  conditions.  The  growth  of  a  purely 
Irish  Labor  Movement,  with  a  tendency  to  break 
away  from  the  British  Movement,  is  an  example  of 
this  difficulty. 

Society,  as  a  complex  of  organizations,  cannot 
stand  for,  or  express,  all  human  life  within  a  com- 
munity, or  the  whole  life  of  any  single  human  being. 
Indeed,  it  is  probably  true  that  what  is  best  and  most 
human  in  men  and  women  escapes  almost  entirely 
from  the  net  of  Society,  because  it  is  incapable  of  j 
being  organized.  Society  is  concerned  mainly  with 
rights  and  duties,  with  deliberate  purposes  and  in- 
terests. While  the  community  is  essentially  ~a~\  ^ 
center  of  feeling,  Society  is  a  center,  or  rather  a 
group  of  centers,  of  deliberation  and  planning,  I 
concerned  far  more  with  means  than  with  ends.  It  J 
is,  of  course,  true  that  an  association  or  an  institu- 
tion can  arouse  in  us  and  make  us  attach  to  it  senti- 
ments of  loyalty  as  well  as  calculated  adherences; 
but  at  least  the  better  part  of  our  feelings  of  love 
and  devotion  are  put  forth  in  purely  personal  rela- 
tionships, or  in  the  narrow  but  intense  community  of 
the  family.  It  is  essential  that  associations  and  in- 
stitutions, and  even  that  Society  itself,  should  be 
able  to  appeal  to  our  sentiments  of  loyalty  and  de- 
votion, but  it  would  be  wrong  to  desire  that  these 
sentiments  should  be  absorbed  in  them.  As  long  as"!^ 
human  life  remains,  most  of  the  best  things  in  it  will 
remain  outside  the  bounds  and  scope  of  organization, 
and  it  will  be  the  chief  function  of  Society  so  to, 
organize  these  parts  of  human  life  which  respond  to 
organization  as  to  afford  the  fullest  opportunity  for 


82  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  development  of  those  human  experiences  and  re- 
lationships to  which  organization  is  the  cold  touch 
of  death. 

Society,  like  community,  is  a  matter  of  degree. 
It  depends  not  only  on  the  volume  and  extent  of 
associative  and  institutional  life  in  the  community, 
but  still  more  on  the  coherence  and  cooperative 
working  of  the  various  associations  and  institutions. 
Where  associative  and  institutional  life  is  vigorous, 
but  there  exist  distinct  castes  and  classes,  each 
with  its  own  network  of  organizations,  not  cooper- 
ating but  conflicting  and  hostile,  then  Society  exists 
indeed,  but  only  in  a  very  low  degree.  The  highest 
development  of  Society  consists  not  only  in  the 
general  diffusion  of  associations  and  institutions, 
over  every  organizable  tract  of  social  life,  but  also  in 
the  harmonious  cooperation  of  all  the  various  bodies, 
each  fulfilling  its  proper  function  within  Society,  in 
harmony  and  agreement  with  the  others.  We  shall 
be  able  to  appreciate  the  full  implications  of  this 
harmony  better  at  a  later  stage,  when  we  have  ex- 
amined more  closely  the  nature  of  associations  and 
institutions,  and  when  we  have  shown  in  its  true  light 
the  principle  of  "function"  as  their  sustaining  prin- 
ciple. 

n  We  have  so  far  spoken  of  associations  and  insti- 
tutions  uncritically,  without  any  attempt  to  examine 
their  nature,  or  to  define  the  sense  in  which  the  terms 
are  used.  To  do  this  is  our  next  task.  We  have 
seen  that  every  developed  community  includes  a 
network  of  associations  and  institutions  of  the  most 
various  kinds,  and  we  have  now  to  explain  their 
character  as  far  as  we  can.  j  This  is  the  central 


difficulty  of  our  subject,  and,  if  this  is  surmounted, 
we  may  fairly  hope  that  much  of  the  rest  will  be 
comparatively  plain  sailing.; 

Men  living  together  in  community  are  conscious 
of  numerous  wants,  both  material  and  spiritual. 
In  order  to  satisfy  these  wants,  they  must  take 
action,  and  accordingly  they  translate  their  con- 
sciousness of  wants  into  will.  These  wants  are  of 
the  most  diverse  character,  and  require  the  most 
diverse  means  for  their  satisfaction.  In  two  respects 
above  all,  they  differ  fundamentally  one  from 
another,  and  their  differences  in  these  respects 
present  the  best  starting-point  for  our  examination. 

Some  wants  are  of  a  simple  character  and  only 
require  a  simple  translation  into  will  and  action  for 
their  fulfillment,  or  for  the  demonstration  that  they 
cannot  be  fulfilled.  Such  wants,  being  essentially 
simple  and  single,  do  not  give  rise  to  any  form  of 
organization.  But  very  many  wants  are  complex, 
and  require  for  their  fulfillment  not  a  single  act  of 
will  or  action,  but  a  whole  course  of  action  sustained 
by  a  continuing  purpose.  It  is  in  such  cases,  where 
the  will  must  be  maintained  over  a  whole  course  of  (/ 
action,  that  the  need 'for  organization  may  arise. 

The  presence  of  deliberate  purpose,  however,  does 
not  necessarily  lead  to  social  organization.  The 
individual  has  often  to  present  to  himself  a  course 
of  action,  and  to  sustain  by  a  continuing  act  of  will 
a  whole  course  of  action.  In  such  a  case  he  may  be 
said  to  "organize"  his  own  mind,  but  organization 
remains  purely  personal  and  within  his  mind.  The 
position  is  different  when  he  finds  that  the  purpose 
before  him  can  only,  or  can  better,  be  furthered  by 


(7 


(7 


84  SOCIAL  THEORY 

his  acting  in  common  with  other  individuals  and 
undertaking  in  common  with  them  a  course  of  action 
which,  he  hopes,  will  lead  to  the  satisfaction  of  the 
want  of  which  he  is  conscious  in  himself.  The 
mere  realization  of  the  need  for  cooperative  action 
does  not,  of  course,  call  the  cooperation  into  being, 
but  it  is  the  basis  on  which  cooperation  can  be 
built.  This  consciousness  of  a  want  requiring  co- 
operative action  for  its  satisfaction  is  the  basis  of 
association. 

The  wants  which  may  lead  to  association  are 
themselves  of  the  most  diverse  kind,  and  can  be  class- 
ified in  the  most  varied  ways.  The  classification 
that  is  necessary  for  our  present  purpose  is,  how- 
ever, clear  enough.  It  is  not  the  "material,"  but 
the  "social"  content  of  the  want  with  which  we  are 
here  concerned.  In  this  aspect,  the  want  may  be 
either  "several"  or  "associative."  It  is,  of  course,  in 
either  case  a  want  of  an  individual,  because  only  in- 
dividuals can  want  anything;  but  its  nature  may 
be  such  that  each  individual  can  enjoy  the  satis- 
faction of  it  by  himself,  even  if  imperfectly,  whether 
the  other  individual  secures  a  like  satisfaction  or  not 
(these  are  the  wants  which  I  have  here  called 
"several"),  or  it  may  be  such  that  it  can  be  enjoyed 
only  by  the  cooperating  group  as  a  whole,  and  not 
by  any  individual  except  in  conjunction  with  other 
individuals.  Of  course,  if  a  want  is  complex  in 
character,  and  is  rather  a  circle  of  wants  than  a 
single  want,  it  may  partake  of  both  natures,  and  be 
at  once  several  and  associative. 

Both  several  and  associative  wants  are  fertile  of 
associations;  but  the  permanence  and  social  value 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING        35 

of  the  associations  which  they  create  differ  con- 
siderably. A  mere  similarity  or  coincidence  of  ob- 
ject, while  it  may  lead  for  a  time  to  very  close 
cooperation  in  pursuit  of  that  object,  does  not 
necessarily  imply  any  similarity  or  coincidence  of 
motive,  and  still  less  any  real  sense  of  community 

t  1  •  T  1  t 

among  those  who  unite  to  pursue  it.  In  the  absence 
of  profound  dissimilarity  of  motive,  it  may  easily 
engender  a  sense  of  community,  and  in  doing  so, 
may  perhaps  convert  a  several  into  an  associative/ 
want.  Thus,  a  group  of  farmers  may  associate 
purely  because  each  sees  in  association  a  prospect  of 
strengthening  his  economic  position;  but,  having 
acted  together,  the  group  may  realize  the  benefits 
of  associative  action,  and  become  inspired  with  the 
cooperative  principle.  Irish  agriculture,  under  the 
guidance  of  A.  E.  and  the  Irish  Homestead,  has 
shown  a  marked  tendency  to  pass  from  severalty 
of  wants  to  associative  wants. 

Wants  which  are  in  their  nature  associative 
commonly  imply  a  close,  constant  and  continuing 
cooperation  among  the  persons  concerned,  both 
until  the  object  of  the  association  has  been  secured, 
and  thereafter  for  its  exercise  and  maintenance. 
Those  who  pursue  them  therefore  become  far  more 
easily  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  community,  and  the 
associations  which  are  created  for  their  fulfillment 
form  a  far  more  vital  part  of  the  structure  of 
Society.  Almost  all  the  great  and  important  associ- 
ations which  exercise  a  vital  influence  on  affairs  at 
the  present  time  do  so  for  one  of  two  reasons.  Either 
they  exist,  or  are  coming  to  exist,  primarily  for 
the  fulfillment  of  associative  wants,  or  they  exercise 


36  SOCIAL  THEORY 

influence,  despite  the  severalty  of  the  wants  with 
which  they  are  concerned,  by  reason  of  some  ex- 
traneous pull,  such  as  the  possession  by  their  mem- 
bers of  vast  wealth.  In  so  far  as  associations  are 
democratic,  they  can  hardly  exercise  abiding  influ- 
ence unless  their  purposes  are  to  a  considerable  ex- 
tent associative. 

It  is  perhaps  necessary  to  illustrate  the  somewhat 
bare  description  given  above  by  a  few  actual  ex- 
amples. A  good  instance  of  pure  severalty  of  aim 
is  to  be  found  in  any  association  which  exists  simply 
and  solely  to  represent  consumers.  A  Railway 
Season-Ticket  Holders'  Association,  for  instance, 
represents  persons  of  the  most  diverse  types,  each 
of  whom,  broadly  speaking,  is  solely  concerned  to 
get  railway  facilities  for  himself  as  cheaply  as  pos- 
sible. A  commercial  or  industrial  company  is  another 
example.  In  a  meeting  of  shareholders,  broadly 
speaking,  each  individual  is  only  concerned  with  the 
amount  of  dividend  he  will  secure,  and  with  the 
expectation  of  future  dividends  presented  to  him 
by  the  general  position  of  the  company.  I  do  not 
mean,  of  course,  that  any  individual  acts  in  such  an 
association  purely  as  season-ticket  holder  or  share- 
holder, or  that  his  communal  instincts  and  ideas 
find  absolutely  no  play.  That  is  not  the  case.  But 
I  do  mean  that  the  bond  of  the  association  itself  is 
purely  several,  and  that  the  fact  of  association 
carries  with  it  no  implication  that  the  individuals 
associated  have  a  common  view  as  to  the  social 
position  of  season  tickets  or  dividends  in  the  com- 
munity, or  a  common  care  for  the  satisfaction  of 
each  other's  needs.  Only  if  there  is  in  the  asso- 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING        37 

ciation  some  other  bond  besides  that  of  pure  sev- 
eralty  will  the  spirit  of  community  be  evoked,  and 
the  association  take  on  a  communal  aspect. 

This  is  not  to  say  that  associations  based  on  pure 
severalty  may  not  be  useful  parts  of  Society.  But, 
as  long  as  their  basis  remains  purely  several,  they 
lack  the  necessary  elements  of  community  which 
will  enable  them  to  link  up  easily  and  enter  into 
complementary  relationship  with  the  rest  of  Society. 
They  have  their  part  to  play;  but  it  is  an  isolated 
and  secondary  part  in  the  social  fabric.  How  they 
act  to-day  we  shall  see  more  clearly  when  we  come 
to  consider  social  theory  in  its  economic  aspects. 
It  is  indeed  in  the  economic  sphere  that  such  asso- 
ciations mainly,  though  not  exclusively,  appear  on 
a  large  scale.  In  almost  all  other  spheres,  although  [j 
associations  based  on  severalty  exist,  they  attain  to 
importance  only  when  their  character  of  severalty 
is  crossed  by  an  associative  want. 

This  very  rough  and  preliminary  analysis  is 
sufficient  to  enable  us  to  proceed  to  the  task  of 
definition.  By  an  "association"  I  mean  any  group 
of  persons  pursuing  a  common  purpose  or  system  or 
aggregation  of  purposes  by  a  course  of  cooperative 
action  extending  beyond  a  single  act,  and,  for  this 
purpose,  agreeing  together  upon  certain  methods  of 
procedure,  and  laying  down,  in  however  rudi- 
mentary a  form,  rules  for  common  action.  At  least 
two  things  are  fundamentally  necessary  to  any  asso- 
ciation— a  common  purpose  or  purposes  and,  to  a 
certain  extent,  rules  of  common  action. 

The  primary  condition  of  all  association  is  a 
common  purpose;  for  the  object  of  all  associations 


38  SOCIAL  THEORY 

being  the  attainment  of  some  end,  there  can  be  no 
association  unless  the  attainment  of  that  end  is 
the  purpose  of  the  members.  The  "end,"  "object," 
or  "interest,"  or  as  I  prefer  to  call  it,  the  "purpose," 
is  the  raison  d'etre  of  every  association.  But,  while 
this  is  a  fundamental  point,  it  is  important  that  it 
should  not  be  pushed  too  far.  The  presence  of  a 
common  purpose  does  not  imply  that  it  must  be 
fully  and  consciously  apprehended  by  all  or,  even 
in  the  case  of  already  established  associations,  a 
majority  of  the  members.  Thus,  an  association 
may  be  constituted  by  its  original  founders  with  a 
definite  purpose;  but,  in  course  of  time,  the  con- 
sciousness of  this  purpose  may  become  blurred,  and 
the  association  may  survive  almost  purposelessly, 
men  joining  it  rather  because  membership  has  be- 
come customary  than  for  the  attainment  of  any  end. 
Some  Churches  are  instances  of  such  atrophied 
forms  of  association. 

Secondly,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  very  many 
associations  have,  not  a  single,  clearly  definable 
purpose,  but  a  number  of  purposes  more  or  less  in- 
timately related  one  to  another.  In  these  cases, 
while,  except  in  the  circumstances  contemplated 
above,  each  member  is  as  a  rule  conscious  of  at 
least  one  of  the  purposes  of  the  association,  it  does 
not  follow  that  each  member  is  conscious  of,  or 
shares  in  the  desire  to  forward,  each  of  the  pur- 
poses in  view.  This  may  occur,  either  because 
a  member  does  not  fully  appreciate  the  interrelation 
of  the  various  purposes,  and  therefore  fails  to 
appreciate  the  significance  of  some  of  them,  or  be- 
cause he  does  really  differ  from  his  fellows  as  to 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING        39 

some  of  the  purposes  contemplated  by  the  associa- 
tion, while  agreeing  with  him  about  the  rest,  and  feel- 
ing the  association  to  be  worth  while  for  their  sake 
alone.  For  example,  when  a  Trade  Union  or  an  em- 
ployers' association  combines  political  and  industrial 
activities,  there  will  be  some  .who,  agreeing  with  the 
principal  objects  of  the  association  and  therefore 
desiring  to  remain  members,  will  dissent  from  some 
of  its  purposes  and  methods.  The  Osborne  Judg- 
ment controversy  some  years  ago,  and  the  recent 
controversy  about  the  use  of  "direct  action"  for 
political  purposes,  alike  served  to  force  this  issue  to 
the  front  in  the  case  of  Trade  Unions.  It  is  perhaps 
unfortunate  that  it  has  not  been  similarly  forced  to 
the  front  in  the  case  of  employers'  associations. 

Thirdly,  we  must  remember  that  associations  are 
sustained  by  human  beings,  and  are  therefore 
capable  of  constant  development.  Changing  circum- 
stances, or  a  changing  appreciation  of  the  same  cir- 
cumstances, may  impel  the  members  of  an  associa- 
tion to  widen  or  to  narrow  its  objects,  or  to  vary 
them  from  time  to  time.  All  associations  possess  a 
considerable  elasticity  in  this  respect,  the  degree  of 
their  elasticity  varying  largely  with  the  amount  of 
coherence  they  possess — which  in  turn  depends 
mainly  upon  the  intensity  of  the  communal  feeling 
which  inspires  them.  But  there  is  for  every  associa- 
tion a  limit  of  elasticity,  and,  strained  beyond  this 
point  by  the  inclusion  of  new  purposes,  the  associa- 
tion will  break,  and  a  new  one  have  to  be  created  to 
fulfill  the  new  purposes.  The  atrophy  of  the  original 
purposes  causes  associations  to  decay.  They  may  re- 
new themselves  by  assuming  new  purposes;  but,  if 


40  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  change  is  too  big  or  too  violent,  they  break. 
Decay  or  breakage  is  the  fate  of  every  association 
in  the  end ;  and  as,  from  one  cause  or  the  other,  asso- 
ciations disappear,  men  create  new  ones  to  take 
their  place. 

So~  much  for  the  common  purposes  which  are  the 
moving  and  sustaining  principle  of  all  associations. 
But,  as  we  saw,  there  is  a  secondary  characteristic 
which  is  essential.  Every  association  must,  in  some 
degree,  prescribe  common  rules  of  action  for  its 
members.  These  rules  may  be  very  few  and  very 
rudimentary,  and  -they  commonly  deal  with  the 
conduct  of  the  members  only  in  relation  to  the 
purposes  of  the  association,  though  they  often 
include  written  or  unwritten  moral  rules  of  conduct 
designed  to  preserve  the  reputation  of  the  associa- 
tion, and  to  act  as  a  sort  of  elementary  guarantee  of 
personal  honor.  These  rules  generally  include  both 
general  rules  designed  to  cover  particular  cases  as 
they  arise,  and  particular  directions  issued  by  the 
governing  body  of  the  association  for  guidance  in 
particular  cases  directly.  With  this  aspect  of  the 
question  we  shall  have  to  deal  more  fully  when 
we  consider,  in  a  later  chapter,  the  problems  of 
democracy  and  representative  government. 

Our  definition  of  the  word  "association"  is  clearly 
very  wide  indeed.  It  excludes  momentary  groups 
formed,  without  definite  organization,  to  carry  out 
some  single  immediate  object;  but  it  includes  all 
organized  groups  possessed  of  a  purpose  entailing 
a  course  of  action.  It  draws  no  distinction  between 
groups  whose  purpose  is  in  some  sense  political  or 
social  or  communal,  and  groups  whose  purpose  is 


NAMES  ANI>  THEIR  MEANING         41 

purely  sociable  or  recreational.  It  covers  a  football 
club  or  a  dining  club  fully  as  much  as  a  Church,  a 
Trade  Union  or  a  political  party. 

Of  course,  it  makes  a  great  difference  to  the  im- 
portance of  an  association,  not  only  how  far  it  is 
representative  of  those  concerned  in  its  purpose,  but 
also  how  important  its  purpose  is.     But  it  is  imX 
possible  to  draw  a  theoretical  line  of  distinction 
between  associations  which  are  "social"  and  asso-  \j 
ciations  which  are  only  sociable.  For  some  practical J 
purposes,  as  for  representation  upon  public  bodies, 
it  is  no  doubt  essential  to  draw  such  a  distinction; 
but  it  is  necessary  to  recognize  that,  however  drawn, 
it  cannot  be  more  than  empirical.     All  associations 
are,  in  their  various  manners  and  degrees,  parts  of 
Society. 

We  can  now  turn  to  the  word  which,  in  the  early 
part  of  this  chapter,  was  so  often  used  in  close  con- 
junction with  the  word  "association."  What  is  an  \ 
institution,  and  in  what  sense  is  the  word  used  in 
this  book?  I  find  the  thing  for  which  the  word 
stands  difficult  to  define  at  all,  and  impossible  to 
define  in  any  but  a  largely  negative  manner.  It  is 
not,  though  it  may  manifest  itself  in  or  through,  a 
group  or  association,  nor  has  it,  strictly  speaking, 
any  members.  It  does,  of  course,  being  a  social 
thing,  appear  in,  and  operate  through,  human  beings 
and  associations ;  but  it  depends  for  its  institutional 
status,  not  upon  a  particular  group  of  persons  who 
are  its  members,  frame  its  rules,  and  seek  to  effect 
through  it  a  common  purpose,  but  upon  a  general  / 
acceptance  and  recognition  by  the  members  of  the- 
community,  backed  by  a  sustaining  force  of  custom 


42  SOCIAL  THEORY 

or  tradition,  with  or  without  the  sanction  of  law. 
It  is  easily  recognizable  in  some  of  its  principal 
instances — marriage,  monogamy,  monarchy,  peer- 
age, caste,  capitalism  and  many  others  belonging  to 
\different  ages  and  civilizations. 

But,  side  by  side  with  this  use  of  the  word,  there 
is  another  use  of  the  word  "institution"  which, 
while  it  suits  well  enough  our  everyday  convenience, 
may  easily  be  a  source  of  confusion  in  a  theoretical 
treatment  of  the  question.  The  word  "institution" 
is  often  used  to  denote  not  only  such  ideas  or  re- 
lations as  those  instanced  above,  but  also  certain 
actual  human  groups  which  are,  in  the  sense  in 
which  we  have  used  the  word,  "associations."  Thus 
Army,  Navy,  Church  and  State,  to  say  nothing  of 
less  important  bodies,  are  often  directly  referred  to 
as  "institutions." 

It  is  important  to  notice  that,  in  the  sense  in 
which  we  are  using  the  word,  Army,  Navy,  Church 
and  State  are  not  "institutions,"  but  associations 
>  in  which  institutions  may  be  held  to  be  embodied  or 
/  expressed.  Thus  the  Church  is  an  association  in 
which  the  institution  of  religion  is  more  or  less  per- 
fectly embodied,  the  State  an  association  more  or 
less  perfectly  embodying  the  institution  of  political 
government,  Army  and  Navy  associations  expres- 
sive of  the  institution  of  natural  force,  and  so  on. 

Now,  an  idea  is  not  an  "institution"  merely 
because  it  is  widely  or  generally  held  or  accepted. 
It  is  an  "institution"  only  if,  in  addition  to  being 
so  accepted,  it  is  embodied  in  some  external  form 
of  social  structure  or  communal  custom,  either  in 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING         43 

an  association  or  in  some  actual  form  of  social 
behavior. 

We  may,  then,  provisionally  define  an  "institu- 
tion" as  a  recognized  custom  or  form  of  social 
tradition  or  idea,  manifested  in  and  through  human 
beings  either  in  their  personal  conduct  and  relation- 
ships or  through  organized  groups  or  associations. 
Thus,  the  institution  of  monarchy  is  manifested  in 
a  king,  and  the  social  recognition  accorded  to  him, 
the  institution  of  peerage  in  the  various  peers  and 
their  status,  the  institution  of  marriage  in  the  vari- 
ous married  persons  and  their  social  recognition.  In 
the  second  group  of  cases,  the  position  appears  to 
be  rather  different;  for  there  we  first  encounter  a 
form  of  association  and  then  recognize  that  its  social 
status  is  due  largely  to  the  fact  that  it  embodies  an 
institution.  In  these  cases,  we  have  to  study  the 
association  directly  as  an  association,  and  then  to 
study  it  further  in  its  character  as  the  embodiment 
of  an  institution. 

An  institution  is,  in  fact,  an  idea  which  is  mani- 
fested concretely  in  some  aspect  of  social  conduct,  . 
and  which  forms  a  part  of  the  underlying  assump- 
tions of  communal  life.  This  does  not  make  it 
permanent,  or  immune  from  decay  or  dissolution, 
though,  as  we  shall  see  in  a  later  chapter,1  it  does 
give  to  it  an  additional  strength  and  power  of 
survival.  It  can,  however,  change  or  decay.  A 
monarchical  Society  may  become  a  Republic,  if  it 
finds  that  the  monarchical  institution  has  outlived 
its  use.  The  Guild  System  was  in  the  Middle  Ages 

'For  a  fuller  treatment  of  the  whole  question,  see  Chap- 
ter XIII. 


44  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  embodiment  of  an  institution;  but  the  modern 
Companies  which  have  descended  from  the  Guilds 
have  sunk  down  to  the  level  of  unimportant  asso- 
ciations and  have  lost  all  claim  to  'institutional 
status. 

But,  although  institutions  and  their  embodiments 
change,  decay  and  die,  it  is  characteristic  of  them  to 
possess  a  greater  degree  of  permanence  than  belongs 
to  most  associations.  This  relative  permanence  has 
both  its  good  and  its  bad  side.  It  helps  to  assure  to 
an  association  or  custom,  which  successfully  em- 
bodies an  idea  found  to  be  vital  to  the  community,  a 
greater  stability  than  its  members  or  its  familiarity 
alone  could  assure  to  it,  by  giving  it  a  communal 
sanction  and  status;  but  it  also  tends  to  cause  the 
survival  of  associations  and  customs  which  have  ac- 
quired an  institutional  character  long  after  they  have 
ceased  to  be  useful.  Our  estimate  of  the  advantages 
and  disadvantages  of  institutions  will  depend  mainly 
upon  our  temperament.  The  temperamental  Con- 
servative (in  no  party  sense)  sees  in  institutions  the 
bulwark  of  Society:  the  temperamental  innovator 
sees  in  them  the  greatest  barrier  to  progress. 

We  shall  use  the  word  "institution"  in  this  book 
mainly  in  a  rather  narrower  sense  than  has  been  here 
assigned  to  it.  It  will  generally  be  used  in  con- 
junction with  the  word  "association"  to  denote 
those  institutions  which  are  not,  or  are  only  in  a 
secondary  sense,  embodied  as  associations.  When 
I  use  it  in  the  wider  sense,  to  include  institutions 
which  are  also  embodied  in  association,  the  context 
will  make  clear  the  sense,  and  I  think  no  confusion 
will  be  created. 


NAMES  AND  THEIR  MEANING         45 

There  is  one  further  word  which  we  must  briefly 
define  before  proceeding  further.  I  have  spoken 
repeatedly  of  custom.  Perhaps  this  word  hardly 
requires  definition  in  the  ordinary  sense;  for  its 
meaning  is  sufficiently  clear.  It  means  no  more 
and  no  less  than  a  social  habit  or  way  of  acting, 
common  to  the  members  of  a  community  or  social 
group,  or  at  least  widely  enough  diffused  among 
them  over  a  long  enough  period  of  time  to  have 
become  in  some  degree  taken  for  granted  and  acted 
upon  in  normal  circumstances  without  any  conscious 
exercise  of  deliberation.  A  custom  is  that  which 
most  men  do  naturally  when  placed  in  the  appro- 
priate circumstances.  It  is  as  vital  to  a  community 
to  have  customs  as  it  is  vital  to  an  individual  to  have 
instincts;  for  customs  are  to  the  community,  as 
instincts  are  to  the  individual  mind — labor-saving 
devices  born  of  long  use  by  successive  generations.1 

Customs,  then,  are  a  vital  part  of  the  being  of 
community ;  but  they  do  not,  as  customs,  enter  into 
the  structure  of  Society — the  organized  part  of  the 
community.  They  enter  into  Society  only  when 
they  become  institutions,  like  marriage,  or  when 
their  maintenance  becomes  a  purpose  to  an  associa- 
tion or  institution.  We  shall  therefore  have  little 
to  say  of  them  in  this  book,  not  because  they  are 
not  important,  but  because,  where  they  appear, 
they  will  appear  largely  under  other  forms. 

Before  I  close  this  chapter,  I  must  endeavor  to 
clear  away  a  difficulty  which  may  easily  have  arisen 
in  the  reader's  mind.  I  have  spoken  of  the  com- 

1  Compare  Samuel  Butler's  Life  and  Habit  and  Prof.  James 
Ward's  Heredity  and  Memory. 


46  SOCIAL  THEORY 

munity  as  sustaining  and  of  Society  as  being  made 
up  of,  associations  and  institutions,  and  of  the  latter 
as  being,  in  different  senses,  within  Society  and 
within  the  community.  Yet  it  is  manifest  that  very 
many  associations  and  institutions  are  international, 
and  extend  far  beyond  the  boundaries  of  social  area 
clearly  recognizable  as  communities  and  social  com- 
plexes which  are  clearly  Societies.  Does  not  this 
present  a  difficulty  ? 

It  will  be  seen  that  no  difficulty  is  involved  if  our 
original  discussion  of  community  is  borne  in  mind. 
We  saw  that  two  or  more  communities  constantly 
claim  the  allegiance  of  a  single  individual.  The 
family,  the  city,  the  nation,  the  group  of  closely 
related  nations,  the  world — all  these  are  communities. 
Every  association  or  institution,  however  wide- 
spread, therefore  exists  within  the  area  of  some 
community.  International  associations  for  specific 
purposes  is  the  forerunner  of  a  closer-knit  interna- 
tional community,  and  can  only  exist  because,  in  a 
rudimentary  form,  international  community  is  al- 
ready a  fact. 

Similarly,  even  international  associations  are 
within  a  Society,  however  rudimentary.  They  are 
the  forerunners  of  a  real  Society  of  Nations  which 
will  be  as  necessary  an  expression  of  international 
community  as  Society  within  a  nation  is  of  national 
community.  Internationally  above  all,  free  asso- 
ciation helps  to  develop  the  sense  of  community  on 
which  it  is  based,  and  to  forward  the  creation  of  an 
international  social  complex  for  the  expression  of 
that  community. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION 

/%  LTHOUGH  our  last  chapter  was  concerned 
y^primarily  with  definitions,  a  number  of  im- 
portant conclusions  have  emerged  from  it. 
We  have  learnt  to  regard  community  as  a  complex 
of  individuals,  associations,  institutions  and  customs 
in  varied  and  multiform  relationships;  we  have 
learnt  to  regard  Society  as  a  complex  of  associations 
and  institutions  expressing,  not  the  whole  of  the 
communal  life,  but  that  part  of  it  which  is  organ- 
ized ;  and  we  have  learnt  to  see  in  associations  bodies 
created  by  the  wills  of  individuals  for  the  expression 
and  fulfillment  of  purposes  which  they  have  in  com- 
mon. We  have,  in  fact,  already  penetrated  the 
essential  and  underlying  structure  of  social  life. 

There  is,  however,  at  least  one  point  of  ultimate 
principle  in  relation  to  which  our  vision  is  still 
fundamentally  incomplete.  Our  method  has  forced 
us  so  far  to  look  at  each  form  of  social  structure  in 
something  like  isolation  from  the  others.  We  have 
analyzed  and  defined;  but  we  have  not,  except  in 
relation  to  community,  as  yet  made  clear  the  struc- 
tural principle  which  makes  the  complexities  of 
social  life  into  something  at  least  approaching  a 
coherent  whole.  The  underlying  principle  of  com- 

47 


48  SOCIAL  THEORY 

munity,  indeed,  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  com- 
munity itself — the  sense  of  unity  and  social  brother- 
hood which  permeates  a  mass  of  men  and  women 
and  makes  them,  in  a  real  se.nse,  one.  But  we  have 
not  seen  what  is  the  underlying  principle  of  social 
organisation,  a  principle  which  must  be  distinct  from 
the  principle  of  community,  however  dependent 
upon  it.  This  principle  is  the  principle  of  Function. 
Most  people  know  something  of  those  ethical 
theories  which,  from  the  time  of  Plato  onwards, 
have  made  "function"  their  governing  principle. 
In  ethics  the  principle  is  that  each  individual  should 
seek  not  his  own  self-interest  as  such,  nor  his  own 
self -development  or  self-expression  as  such,  but 
the  fulfillment  of  his  function  in  the  social  whole  of 
which  he  forms  a  part.  His  "end"  is  not  to  be  an 
isolated  or  purely  personal  end,  but  an  end  which  at 
once  places  him  in  relation  to  something  beyond 
himself.  Pushed  to  an  extreme,  this  theory  may 
easily  result  not  merely  in  a  denial  of  all  democracy, 
but  in  a  denial  of  personality  itself  as  an  ultimate  or 
"end"  in  a  glorification  and  personification  of 
Society  in  which  human  values  are  largely  lost,  and 
the  personal  aspects  of  life  rigidly  subordinated  to 
the  collective  elements.  "Function"  is  eminently 
unsatisfactory  as  an  ethical  principle,  that  is,  as  the 
principle  which  should  determine  individual  conduct, 
not  because  each  individual  has  not,  in  a  very  real 
sense,  his  function  to  fulfill,  but  because  he  has  so 
many  various  functions,  and  because  it  is  just  in  the  - 
choice  of  and  between  functions  and  in  assigning 
their  relative  places  to  the  many  functions,  social 
and  personal,  of  which  we  are  conscious,  that  our 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION        49 

selfhood  appears  as  a  coodinating  principle  beyond 
any  of  them. 

But  the  fact  that  function  is  not  the  paramount 
ethical  principle  does  not  mean  that  it  is  not  the 
paramount  principle  of  social  organization.  We  have 
seen  that  men  make,  and  enter  into,  associations  for 
the  purpose  of  satisfying  common  wants,  that  is,  in 
terms  of  action,  for  the  execution  of  common  pur- 
poses. Every  such  purpose  or  group  of  purposes  is 
the  basis  of  the  function  of  the  association  which 
has  been  called  into  being  for  its  fulfillment.  Again,  " 
every  institution  in  Society  has  an  object  which 
has  determined  the  main  lines  of  its  growth. 
The  fulfillment  of  this  object  is,  then,  the  necessary 
basis  of  the  function  of  the  institution.  Of  course, 
either  an  association  or  an  institution  may  be  itself 
complex  and  have  a  variety  of  related  purposes  or 
objects,  and  therefore  perhaps  a  variety  of  related 
functions.  But  as  the  purpose  or  object  behind  an 
association  or  institution  must  be  specific  and  in 
some  degree  intelligible  in  order  to  have  the  power  to 
call  the  association  or  institution  into  being,  so  the 
functions  of  all  associations  and  institutions,  how- 
ever they  may  change  and  develop,  are,  in  the  last 
resort,  also  specific. 

This  is  the  reason  why  the  functional  principle  is 
finally  applicable  to  associations  and  institutions, 
but  not  to  individuals.  ;Every  individual  is  in  his 
nature  universal :  his  actions  and  courses  of  action, 
his  purposes  and  desires,  are  specific  because  he 
makes  them  so;  but  he  himself  is  not,  and  cannot 
be,  made  specific,  and  therefore  cannot  be  expressed 
in  terms  of  function.  This  essential  difference 


50  SOCIAL  THEORY 

makes  once  more  manifest  the  falsity  of  the  parallel 
that  is  often  drawn  between  individuals  and  as- 
sociations. An  association  is  not,  and  cannot  be, 
in  any  real  sense,  a  "person,"  because  it  is  specific 
and  functional,  and  not  universal.  The  individual 
becomes  "functional,"  or  rather  "multi-functional," 
only  by  limiting  himself;  the  association  is  func- 
tional and  limited  by  its  very  nature. 

But  function  is  not  so  much  the  final  cause  of 
each  separate  association,  as  the  principle  under- 
lying the  unity  and  coherence  of  associations.  We 
have  seen  that  the  value  and  full  development  of 
Society  depends  not  only  on  the  wide  prevalence 
and  diffusion  of  association  in  the  Commonwealth, 
but  also  on  the  successful  cooperation  and  coherence 
of  the  various  associations.  The  possibility  of  this 
coherence  depends  upon  the  fulfillment  by  each  as- 
sociation of  its  social  function.  In  so  far  as  the 
various  associations  fulfill  their  respective  social 
purposes,  and  in  so  far  as  these  purposes  are  them- 
selves complementary  and  necessary  for  social  well- 
being,  the  welter  of  associations  in  the  community 
is  converted  into  a  coherent  Society.  In  so  far  as 
the  associations  work  irrespective  of  their  function 
in  a  social  whole,  or  set  before  themselves  purposes 
which  are  mutually  contradictory  and  irreconcilable 
with  the  good  of  the  whole,  the  development  out  of 
the  welter  of  associations  of  a  coherent  Society  is 
thwarted  and  retarded. 

It  will  be  observed  that  a  new  consideration  has 
been  introduced  into  the  argument  in  the  course  of 
the  preceding  paragraph.  In  treating  function  as 
the  characteristic,  not  of  an  isolated  association,  but 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OH  FUNCTION        51 

of  an  association  as  a  factor  in  a  coherent  social 
whole,  or  at  least  a  social  whole  capable  of  coherence, 
we  have  introduced  a  consideration  of  value  which 
compels  us  to  scrutinize  the  purpose  of  each  particu- 
lar association  in  the  light  of  its  communal  value 
in  and  for  the  whole. 

This  consideration  is,  of  course,  in  no  sense  novel. 
The  point  is  clearly  stated,  although  the  implications 
of  it  are  not  clearly  realized,  in  Rousseau's  Discourse 
on  Political  Economy  in  the  following  words : 1 — 

"Every  political  Society  is  composed  of  other 
smaller  societies  of  different  kinds,  each  of  which 
has  its  interests  and  rules  of  conduct;  but  those 
societies    which    everybody    perceives,    because 
they  have  an  external  and  authorized  form,  are 
not  the  only  ones  which  actually  exist  in  the  com- 
munity :  all  individuals  who  are  united  by  a  com- 
mon interest  compose  as  many  others,  temporary 
or  permanent,  whose  influence  is  none  the  less  real 
because  it  is  less  apparent,  and  the  proper  obser- 
vation of  whose  relations  is  the  true  knowledge  of 
public  morals  and  manners." 
Thus,  if  we  view  an  association  as  an  isolated 
unit,  its  object  can  be  only  the  fulfillment  of  what- 
ever purpose  or  purposes  its  members  have  created 
and  maintain  it  to  fulfill.     Its  will  is,  in  Rousseau's 
sense,   "general"  2  in  relation  to  the  members  of 

1  Rousseau,  Political  Economy,  my  (Everyman)  edition, 
P-  253. 

*  The  use  of  the  word  "general"  in  this  connection  must  not 
be  understood  as  contradicting,  what  was  said  earlier,  that 
the  function  of  every  association  is  "specific"  and  not  "gen- 
eral." Its  purpose  and  function  remain  "specific,"  whether  the 
will  behind  it  be  "general"  or  "particular." 


52  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  association,  but  "particular"  in  relation  to  the 
community  as  a  whole. 

The  members  of  an  association,  as  we  have  seen, 
can  only  come  together  and  work  together  in  the 
association  if  they  have,  to  a  certain  extent,  a  com- 
mon object  or  purpose.  Clearly,  such  a  purpose 
may  be  one  that  is  socially  desirable,  or  it  may  be 
one  that  hardly  affects  any  person  outside  the 
association  for  either  good  or  ill,  or  it  may  be  defi- 
nitely anti-social.  The  mere  fact  that  the  associa- 
tion seeks  only  the  "interest"  of  its  own  members 
(as,  if  the  word  "interest"  is  understood  in  a  wide 
enough  sense,  every  association,  like  every  individ- 
ual, must  do),  is  not  enough  to  make  it  anti-social, 
or  to  prevent  it  from  being  socially  desirable.  It  is 
for  the  good  of  the  community  that  each  group  with- 
in it  should  keep  itself  amused,  instructed,  devel- 
oped; for  these  goods  of  individuals  are,  so  far, 
clear  additions  to  the  common  stock  of  happiness, 
which  can  only  be  the  happiness  of  individuals.  An 
association  becomes  anti-social  not  in  seeking  the 
good  of  its  own  members,  but  in  seeking  their  good 
in  ways  which  detract  from  the  good  of  others. 
Such  detraction  only  occurs  either  when  one  asso- 
ciation's objects  come  into  conflict  with  those  of  an- 
other, so  that  both  cannot  be  fully  satisfied,  or  when 
an  association  aims  at  an  object  which  conflicts 
with  the  personal  objects  of  some  individual, 
whether  a  member  of  the  association  or  not.  Wher- 
ever such  a  conflict  occurs,  coherence  is  impaired, 
and  the  complementary  working  of  associations  and 
individuals  is  made  less  perfect.  The  existence  of 
conflict  shows  that  something  is  wrong;  but  it  does 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION        53 

not,  of  course,  show  on  which  side  the  wrong  lies, 
or  how  it  is  distributed  between  the  two. 

We  seem  here  to  be  confronted  with  a  difficulty. 
We  cannot  accept  the  objects  of  each  association, 
just  as  its  members  have  made  them,  as  making 
for  a  coherent  Society  and  a  development  of  the 
sense  of  community.  It  is,  indeed,  manifest  that 
very  many  associations,  in  seeking  a  partial  good 
for  their  own  members,  are  acting  anti-socially  and 
impairing  the  coherence  of  Society  as  a  whole.  We 

,  ,  ....  /  .          .  .  VA1.TC.A' 

must,  therefore,  criticise  the  value  associations  in 
accordance  with  some  "definite  standard. 

The  term  "function"  is  in  itself,  as  applied  to 
associations,  a  reference  to  such  a  standard  of 
value;  for  it  places  each  association  in  relation, 
not  only  to  its  own  members,  but  to  other  associa- 
tions and  institutions,  that  is,  to  Society,  and  also 
to  individuals — to  both  the  organized  and  the  un- 
organized parts  of  social  life,  that  is,  to  Community. 
If  our  first  question  in  relation  to  any  association 
must  be,  "What  are  the  purposes  which  this  as- 
sociation was  created  and  is  maintained  by  its  mem- 
bers to  subserve?"  we  ask  that  question  only  in  order 
to  be  able  the  better  to  proceed  at  once  to  a  second 
question,  "What  is  the  function  which  this  associa- 
tion can  serve  in  Society  and  in  community?" 

This  does  not  mean,  of  course,  that  it  is  possible 
arbitrarily  to  determine  from  outside  what  the  func- 
tion of  an  association  is.  The  first  question  is  no 
less  essential  than,  and  is  essential  to,  the  second. 
A  "function"  can  only  be  based  upon  a  purpose.  If 
men  have  formed  an  association  for  one  purpose,  we 
cannot  properly  tell  them  that  its  function  is  to 


54  SOCIAL  THEORY 

do  something  quite  different  which  has  never  entered 
into  their  heads.  The  fact  that  the  purposes  of 
men  in  associations  change  and  develop  does  indeed 
enable  us  to  some  extent  to  anticipate  changes  and 
developments,  and  to  say  that  an  association  will 
find  its  true  function  by  proceeding  along  a  line  of 
development  along  which  it  has  already  begun  to 
move.  But,  apart  from  such  intelligent  anticipa- 
tions, we  are  limited  in  assigning  to  any  association 
its  function  to  the  purposes  which  its  members  have 
set  before  themselves  in  creating  and  maintaining  it. 

Social  purposes  are,  thus,  the  raw  material  of  so- 
cial functions,  and  social  functions  are  social  pur- 
poses selected  and  placed  in  coherent  relationship. 
This  selection  cannot  have  a  purely  scientific  basis; 
for  it  is  a  matter  of  ends  as  well  as  means,  and  de- 
pends upon  individual  standards  of  value  and  the 
kind  of  social  life  which  the  individual  desires. 
Thus  at  this,  as  at  every  other  fundamental  point  of 
social  theory,  we  are  driven  back  upon  the  individ- 
ual consciousness  and  judgment  as  the  basis  of  all 
social  values.  Mr.  Colvin  of  the  Morning  Post  re- 
gards one  kind  of  social  life  as  finally  desirable,  and 
I  another.  There  is  a  sense  in  which  I  believe  most 
firmly  that  I  am  right  and  he  is  wrong;  but  social 
theory  cannot  reconcile  that  fundamental  difference 
between  us  which  is  a  difference  of  ends,  though 
it  may  clear  away  misunderstandings  and  prevent 
loose  thinking  on  both  sides. 

Each  of  us  has  in  his  mind,  whether  we  rational- 
ize and  systematize  it  or  not,  some  conception  of  the 
sort  of  social  life  which  is  ultimately  desirable. 
Our  conceptions  of  the  functions  of  particular 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION        55 

associations  are  inevitably  formed  in  the  light  of  our 
ultimate  conception  of  social  value.  In  laying  bare 
the  basis  of  community  it  should  be  possible  for 
men  of  varying  standards  and  temperaments  to 
agree;  but  I  am  fully  conscious  that  in  the  later 
chapters  of  this  book  I  shall  inevitably,  as  I  come 
to  deal  with  more  concrete  subjects,  more  and  more 
obtrude  my  own  standards  of  valuation.  I  can  lay 
bare  the  functional  basis  of  association  without 
bringing  my  temperament  into  the  argument;  but 
as  soon  as  I  begin  to  deal  with  the  actual  function 
of  any  particular  association  there  will  certainly  be 
wigs  on  the  green. 

That  point  in  the  argument,  however,  we  have 
not  yet  reached.  We  must  first  carry  a  good  deal 
further  our  examination  of  the  principle  of  function 
in  its  general  application.  Function,  we  have  seen, 
emerges  clearly  when,  and  only  when,  an  association 
is  regarded,  not  in  isolation,  but  in  relation  to  other 
associations  and  to  individuals,  that  is,  to  some  ex- 
tent in  relation  to  a  system  of  associations,  a  So- 
ciety, and  a  system  of  associations  and  individuals, 
a  community.  Such  a  system  evidently  implies  a 
more  or  less  dear  demarcation  of  spheres  as  between 
the  various  functional  associations,  in  order  that 
each  may  make  its  proper  contribution  to  the  whole 
without  interfering  with  the  others.  It  is,  however, 
easy,  in  search  of  symmetry,  to  push  this  point  too 
far.  It  is  essential  that  the  main  lines  of  demarca- 
tion should  be  laid  down,  and,  in  the  case  of  the 
more  vital  forms  of  association,  that  they  should 
be  most  carefully  and  exactly  drawn,  wherever 
possible  by  experience  rather  than  by  arbitrary 


56  SOCIAL  THEORY 

"constitution-making";  but  in  the  case  of  the  less 
vital  forms  of  association,  which  affect  the  general 
structure  of  Society  only  in  a  small  degree  either  for 
good  or  for  ill,  the  same  exact  delimitation  of 
spheres  is  unnecessary,  and  even  undesirable  as  de- 
tracting from  the  freedom  and  spontaneity  of  asso- 
ciation. 

We  must  indeed  bear  in  mind  always  that  asso- 
ciations are  not  mere  machines,  but  are  capable  of 
growth  and  development.  We  must  not,  therefore, 
even  in  the  case  of  the  most  vital  associations,  so 
exactly  define  their  function  and  sphere  of  operation 
for  to-day  as  to  prevent  them  from  developing  the 
power  to  exercise  their  function  of  to-morrow.  If 
we  do,  the  result  will  not  be  in  most  cases  what  we 
expect.  The  association  will  develop  in  spite  of 
prohibition ;  but  in  developing  it  may  well  break  the 
Society  which  encloses  it,  or  at  the  least  cause  vast 
waste  of  energy  and  unnecessary  friction.  We  must 
remember  always  that  it  is  of  vital  importance  for  a 
community  not  to  be  compelled  constantly  to  make 
for  itself  new  sets  of  associations,  but  rather  to  de- 
velop out  of  old  ones  the  changed  forms  which  are 
required  for  the  fulfillment  of  new  functions.  It 
is  this  vital  need  of  community  that  makes  it  so  im- 
portant to  preserve  as  far  as  possible  the  freedom 
of  association  and  the  greatest  spontaneity  of  asso- 
ciative action  that  is  consistent  with  social  coherence. 

There  are,  of  course,  risks  attaching  to  this 
course.  If  association  is  left  largely  free  and  un- 
trammeled,  many  associations,  instead  of  fulfilling 
their  function  in  the  social  whole,  will  concern  the'm- 
selves  to  a  considerable  extent  in  fulfilling  even  the 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION        57 

anti-social  purposes  of  their  members,  or  in  doing 
something  which,  while  it  is  in  itself  not  anti-social 
but  even  socially  valuable,  falls  within  the  function 
of  some  other  form  of  association.  There  arise  in 
this  way  two  main  forms  of  perversion  of  function, 
leading  respectively  to  opposition  and  to  confusion 
in  Society.  These  two  forms  of  perversion  cannot, 
of  course,  be  kept  clearly  distinct;  for  they  often 
appear  together  in  the  same  association  and  in  the 
same  act.  They  are,  however,  theoretically  dis- 
tinct, and  we  can,  at  the  outset,  examine  them  sepa- 
rately. 

Opposition  arises,  as  we  have  seen,  when  an 
association  pursues  a  purpose  which,  being  a  pur- 
pose of  its  own  members,1  is  anti-social  in  that 
it  not  only  conflicts  with  the  purposes  of  other 
associations  or  individuals,  but  with  the  good  of  the 
community.  Opposition,  then,  arises  from  the  pur- 
suit of  anti-social  purposes.  Strictly  speaking,  no 
anti-social  purpose  can  be  a  part  of  the  function 
of  an  association,  in  the  sense  in  which  we  are  using 
the  term  "function."  But,  as  a  function  is  always 
a  complex  thing,  the  element  of  "opposition"  may 
arise  in  the  course  of  the  pursuit  of  a  socially 
desirable  function.  Thus,  the  production  of  com- 
modities for  use  and  the  preservation  of  order  are 
both  socially  desirable  functions;  but  either  of 
them  may  be  pursued  in  anti-social  ways  which 
give  rise  to  "opposition"  and  perversion  of  func- 
tion. If  an  association  producing  commodities 
for  use  makes  its  main  object  not  the  production 

*Or,  of  course,  of  an  effective  majority  or  effective  "con- 
scious minority"  of  them. 


58  SOCIAL  THEORY 

for  use,  but  the  realization  of  a  profit  for  its  mem- 
bers, perversion  of  function  arises.  Commodities 
are  still  produced  "for  use"  in  a  sense;  but  the 
function  of  the  association  is  perverted  by  the  intro- 
duction of  the  profit-making  purpose.  Similarly, 
if  an  association  whose  function  is  the  preservation 
of  order  preserves  order  in  the  interest  of  a  single 
class  and  deals  unequal  justice  to  rich  and  poor, 
law  and  order  are  still  partially  preserved;  but  the 
function  of  the  association  is  perverted  by  its  par- 
tiality and  the  foundations  of  justice  are  to  some 
extent  undermined.  We  shall  have  much  more  to 
say  of  this  subject  when  we  come  to  consider  the 
economic  structure  of  Society  and  the  problem  of 
class-divisions  within  the  community. 

Confusion  arises  when  two  associations  attempt 
to  fulfill  the  same  purpose,  and  when  the  purpose 
is  such  as  requires  not  a  multiplicity  of  doers,  but 
doing  on  a  coordinated  plan.  Such  confusion 
may  be  perfectly  bona  fide  and  even  fortuitous. 
There  are  functions  which  lie  on  the  border-line  of 
two  or  more  associations,  but  which  must  be  ful- 
filled by  only  one  if  confusion  is  to  be  avoided. 
Again,  there  are  many  cases  in  which  two  or  more 
associations,  whose  purposes  were  originally  dis- 
tinct, develop  towards  the  same  object,  and  become 
wholly  or  partly  identical  in  function.  Such  cases 
are  often  dealt  with  by  amalgamation;  but  failing 
this  or  an  agreed  re-allocation  of  functions,  con- 
fusion arises.  Again,  in  many  cases  there  is  some 
job  which  badly  needs  doing,  and  two  or  more 
groups  of  men  simultaneously  conceive  the  idea 
of  forming  an  association  for  the  doing  of  it.  Here 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OF  FUNCTION        59 

again  amalgamation  is  often  the  obvious  remedy. 
Many  other  cases  can  easily  be  brought  to  mind 
in  which  confusion  of  functions  arises  even  where 
the  purposes  of  the  associations  concerned  are  ad- 
mitted to  be  socially  desirable  or  not  harmful. 

Mingled  confusion  and  opposition,  involving  a 
double  perversion  of  function,  is  very  frequent. 
Let  us  return  to  our  case  of  the  production  of  com- 
modities. Under  the  existing  economic  order  of 
Society,  there  is  more  than  one  party  to  such  pro- 
duction. Employers  and  workers  are  alike  strongly, 
and  separately,  organized  in  economic  associations. 
Very  often  the  employers  in  a  given  industry  and  the 
workers  in  that  industry  are  endeavoring  to  secure 
the  adoption  of  diametrically  opposite  policies  in 
relation  to  the  same  thing.  Their  purposes  are 
opposed,  and,  without  entering  into  the  moral 
factors  in  the  situation,  we  can  see  that  this  often 
leads  to  perversion  of  the  function  of  the  association 
by  way  both  of  opposition  and  of  confusion.  That 
is  to  say,  both  associations  seek  to  cover  to  some 
extent  the  same  field  of  activity  and  this  leads  to 
confusion,  even  if  their  points  of  view  are  not 
fundamentally  opposed;  but  often  in  addition 
each  advocates  a  different  policy,  so  that  not  only 
confusion,  but  also  actual  conflict,  results. 

It  is  important  to  notice  that  perversion  of  func- 
tion in  one  case,  especially  where  the  perversion 
gives  rise  to  actual  opposition,  frequently  leads  to, 
and  even  necessitates,  perversion  of  function  in 
other  cases.  If  the  appropriate  organization  is  not 
fulfilling  a  particular  function,  it  may  become 
necessary  or  desirable  for  some  other  organization, 


60  SOCIAL  THEORY 

less  fitted  by  its  nature  for  the  task,  to  undertake 
to  fulfill  it  as  best  it  can.  Again,  if  one  association 
is  fulfilling  its  function  in  a  perverted  manner,  so 
as  to  serve  a  sectional  instead  of  a  general  interest, 
it  may  be  necessary  or  desirable  for  some  other 
organization  to  intervene  in  order  to  redress  the 
balance.  Current  controversies  about  the  use  of 
direct  action  (i.e.  the  strike)  for  political  purposes 
serve  to  illustrate  this  point.  It  is  contended  by 
many  of  the  advocates  of  direct  action  that  the  per- 
version of  function  on  the  part  of  the  State  makes  it 
necessary  for  the  Trade  Unions  to  act  in  the  indus- 
trial field  in  order  to  counteract  the  effects  of  this 
political  perversion.  It  falls  outside  the  scope  of 
our  present  inquiry  to  determine  whether  this 
argument  is  sound  or  not  in  any  particular  case; 
but  it  is  clear  that  such  cases  can  and  do  arise. 

At  the  same  time,  it  must  always  be  remembered 
that  perversion  of  functions  is  always,  in  itself,  a 
bad  thing,  whether  it  is  spontaneous  perversion  or 
consequential  perversion  designed  to  counteract  a 
perversion  which  has  already  taken  place.  It  may 
be  necessary  in  certain  cases;  but  the  mere  fact 
of  its  necessity  is  a  clear  indication  that  all  is  not 
well  with  Society.  When  Society  is  in  health,  each 
association  fulfills  its  social  function  with  the  mini- 
mum of  perversion. 

Indeed,  when  counteracting  forms  of  perversion 
become  necessary  on  any  large  scale,  they  serve  as  a 
clear  indication  that  the  structure  of  Society  re- 
quires to  be  overhauled.  Perversion,  carried  to  an 
extreme,  and  accompanied  by  its  counteracting 
forms  leads  to  revolution,  followed  by  a  reconstruc- 


THE  PRINCIPLE  OP  FUNCTION        61 

tion  of  the  body  social.  Such  revolution  can,  of 
course,  be  more  or  less  complete;  and  involve  a 
more  or  less  complete  reconstructing  and  a  more  or 
less  complete  "sweep"  of  the  old  social  regime. 
Often,  less  degrees  of  perversion  and  counter-per- 
version compel  a  readjustment  of  social  organiza- 
tion without  the  need  for  a  general  evolution  in  the 
body  social.  The  first  so-called  "revolution"  in 
Russia  was  rather  such  a  readjustment  than  a  real 
revolution;  but,  this  proving  inadequate,  it  was 
followed  by  the  "November  Revolution,"  which  was 
a  real  revolution  involving  a  fundamental  recon- 
struction of  Society. 

It  is  impossible  to  study  the  forms  of  functional 
perversion  with  any  completeness  without  a  fairly 
thorough  examination  of  the  problem  of  social 
classes,  which  has  been  responsible,  at  least  in 
recent  times,  for  by  far  the  greatest  amount  of 
perversion.  It  is  also  Impossible  to  make  the  study 
complete  without  dealing  with  the  position  of 
organized  religion,  i.e.  Churches,  in  Society;  for 
religious  differences  have  been,  at  least  in  former 
times,  almost  equally  potent  causes  of  perversion. 
Both  these  points,  however,  must  be  reserved  for 
later  consideration.  In  this  chapter,  our  object 
has  been  merely  that  of  laying  bare  the  functional 
principle  itself,  on  the  basis  on  which  Society,  as 
a  complex  of  associations  and  institutions,  must 
rest  if  it  is  to  achieve  any  degree  of  coherence  or  to 
make  possible  a  real  and  abiding  spirit  of  commu- 
nity. Perversion  of  function,  by  destroying  the  co- 
herence of  social  organization,  not  only  upsets  the 
balance  of  Society,  but  stirs  up  bad  blood  between 


62  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  members  of  the  community,  and  thereby  impairs 
that  part  of  the  life  of  the  individual  which  falls 
outside  the  sphere  of  social  organization,  almost 
equally  with  that  part  which  falls  within  it.  Due 
performance  by  each  association  of  its  social  func- 
tion, on  the  other  hand,  not  only  leads  to  smooth 
working  and  coherence  in  social  organization,  but 
also  removes  the  removable  social  hindrances  to  the 
"good  life"  of  the  individual.  In  short,  function 
is  the  key  not  only  to  "social,"  but  also  to  com- 
munal and  personal  well-being. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE   FORMS  AND   MOTIVES   OF   ASSOCIATION 

THE  time  has  now  come  for  a  more  thorough 
examination  of  the  forms  of  association  which 
exist  in  Society,  and  for  some  further  dis- 
cussion of  the  social  character  of  the  motives  under- 
lying association.  I  do  not  mean  that  an  exhaustive 
enumeration  of  the  forms  of  association,  or  even  an 
exhaustive  classification  of  them,  is  either  possible 
or  desirable — still  less  that  the  motives  behind 
association  can  be  satisfactorily  reduced  to  a  few 
broad  and  simple  categories.  The  object  of  this 
chapter  is  essentially  tentative.  I  shall  only  try 
to  enumerate  and  classify  the  main  forms  of  asso- 
ciation— those  which  possess  the  greatest  degree  of 
social  content,  and  to  discuss  briefly  those  dominant 
social  motives  which  are  constantly  appearing  in 
many  diverse  forms  of  association. 

Even  apart  from  the  limitations  of  our  space  and 
time,  there  is  one  fact  which  would  by  itself  forbid 
any  exhaustive  catalogue.  Social  association  is  for- 
ever assuming  new  forms  and  discarding  old -ones, 
as  new  problems  emerge  for  men  to  deal  with,  and 
as  men  change  their  attitude  towards  the  problems 
which  confront  them.  The  fountain  of  association 

63 


64  SOCIAL  THEORY 

does  not  run  dry,  and  it  is  impossible  to  enumerate 
all  those  who  come  to  drink  of  its  waters.  More- 
over, if  we  could  enumerate  to-day,  our  list  would  be 
out  of  date  to-morrow ;  for  new  forms  of  association 
would  have  arisen  which  very  possibly  would  not 
fit  into  any  classification  which  we  might  have  de- 
vised on  the  basis  of  our  present  knowledge. 

Nevertheless,  we  can  usefully  proceed  to  a  classi- 
fication of  a  sort.  While  new  forms  of  association 
are  constantly  arising,  the  essential  forms  of 
association  only  vary  over  considerable  periods. 
That  even  the  most  essential  forms  do  vary,  appear 
and  disappear,  cannot  be  denied.  There  have  been 
many  independent  communities  without  a  State; 
yet  to  most  people  to-day  the  State  appears  to  be  an 
essential  form  of  association.  The  Guilds  were  an 
essential  form  in  the  Middle  Ages;  but  where  are 
the  Guilds  to-day?  It  is  true  that  we  have  to-day 
instead  of  craft  Guilds  many  other  forms  of  eco- 
nomic associations;  but  is  even  economic  associa- 
tion an  essential  form  for  all  communities?  Have 
there  not  been  communities  devoid  of  distinct  eco- 
nomic organization  ?  This  can  only  be  denied  by  those 
who  persist,  in  face  of  all  vital  considerations,  in 
regarding  the  family  in  certain  primitive  Societies 
as  primarily  and  distinctly  an  economic  association. 
The  family  in  these  Societies  certainly  had  eco- 
nomic, among  other,  functions;  but  this  is  not 
enough  to  constitute  it  as,  in  its  fundamental  char- 
acter, an  economic  association. 

We  must  recognize,  then,  not  only  that  the  forms 
of  association  vary  constantly  from  day  to  day,  but 
also  that  even  the  essential  forms  vary  over  longer 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         65 

periods.  Our  classification  therefore  has  reference, 
not  to  all  social  situations,  but  to  the  social  situation 
of  the  civilized  communities  of  our  own  day.  Even 
so  it  is  necessarily  imperfect ;  for  the  institutions  of 
revolutionized  Russia  and  Hungary  require,  in  some 
respects,  a  new  classification,  and  a  revolution  else- 
where in  civilized  countries  may  compel  a  general 
amendment  of  the  classification  which  is  adopted 
here.  The  nearer  we  approach  in  this  book  to  the 
study  of  actual  social  organizations,  the  more 
limited  and  inadequate  we  shall  necessarily  find  our 
generalizations  to  become. 

It  will  be  a  part  of  our  object  in  this  chapter, 
not  merely  to  describe  the  outstanding  forms  of 
association  in  our  own  day  and  generation,  but  to 
attempt,  to  some  extent,  to  discriminate  between 
essential  and  non-essential  forms.  This  is,  of 
course,  a  matter  of  degree,  and  no  definite  line  can 
be  drawn.  There  are,  however,  apart  from  doubtful 
cases,  certain  forms  of  association  which  can  fitly 
be  described  as  essential  to  Society,  and  certain 
others  which  are  not  essential  to  Society.  It  must 
be  made  clear  at  the  outset  that  this  discrimination 
does  not  imply  any  moral  valuation.  All  associa- 
tions must  finally  be  judged  and  valued  by  their 
service  to  the  individuals  who  are  members  of  the 
community,  and  it  may  well  be  found  that  some  of 
the  associations  which  are  here  classified  as  non- 
essential  are  of  transcendent  value  to  the  individual. 
This,  however,  is  not  the  question  with  which  I  am 
here  concerned.  It  is  purely  with  social  essen- 
tiality that  our  classification  deals.  That  is  to  say, 
a  part  of  my  present  purpose  is  to  discriminate 


66  SOCIAL  THEORY 

between  those  associations  which  form  an  integral 
part  of  the  organized  coherence  of  Society,  from 
those  which,  however  great  their  value,  are  not  in 
this  sense  integral  and  essential  to  organized  Society. 
The  meaning  and  purpose  of  this  discrimination  will 
emerge  more  clearly  at  a  later  stage. 

We  may  reasonably  expect  to  find  the  essential 
forms  of  association  among  those  forms  which  are 
outstanding,  and  occur  to  the  mind  naturally  as 
typical  forms.  It  does  not  follow  by  any  means 
that  all  outstanding  forms  are  essential:  I  have 
only  said  that  essential  forms  are  likely  to  be  out- 
standing. We  must  begin,  then,  with  at  least  a 
partial  classification  of  outstanding  forms. 

This  classification  cannot  be  entirely  simple  in 
character;  for  there  are  two  different  principles  on 
which  it  must  be  based.  We  have  to  consider  both 
(a)  the  content  of  the  interest  which  the  association 
sets  before  itself;  and  (b)  its  method  of  operation 
in  relation  to  that  interest.  The  first  of  these 
principles  is  of  supreme  importance  in  revealing  the 
interrelation  in  Society  of  the  various  forms  of 
association,  that  is,  their  specific,  functions;  the  sec- 
ond is  of  primary  importance  in  discriminating  be- 
tween essential  and  non-essential  forms. 

According  to  the  first  of  these  two  ways  of  classi- 
fication, we  have  to  distinguish  between  associations 
according  to  the  content  of  their  various  interests. 
Here  the  chief  forms  which  emerge  at  once  into 
view  are  the  political,  the  vocational  and  appetitive, 
the  religious,  the  provident,  the  philanthropic,  the 
sociable,  and  the  theoretic.  There  are  others;  but 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         67 

most  of  the  prevalent  forms  of  association  fall  un- 
der one  or  another  of  these  heads. 

Of  some  of  the  more  important  forms  of  political 
association  we  shall  have  much  more  to  say  in  the 
next  chapter,  when  we  deal  with  the  State  and 
kindred  forms  of  association  and  institution.  We 
must,  however,  say  something  of  them  here.  By 
a  political  association  I  mean  an  association  of 
which  the  main  purpose  is  to  deal  with  those 
personal  relationships  which  arise  directly  out  of 
the  fact  that  men  live  together  in  communities, 
and  which  require,  and  are  susceptible  to,  social 
organization.  I  freely  admit  that  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  define  accurately  or  clearly  the  nature 
and  functions  of  political  association,  and  I  must 
make  it  plain  that  nothing  that  is  said  in  this  chapter 
is  intended  to  prejudge  the  question,  discussed  in 
the  next  chapter,  whether  the  State,  for  instance, 
can  be  regarded  as  a  purely  political  association  in 
the  sense  here  given  to  the  word.  That  is  a  very  big 
question  indeed;  but  it  does  not  affect  the  present 
issue.  I  am  here,  and  throughout  this  book,  using 
the  term  "political"  in  a  definite  and  limited  sense, 
in  which  it  is  contrasted  with  vocational,  religious 
and  other  functional  terms. 

A  political  association,  then,  is  an  association  of 
which  the  purposes  and  interests  are  primarily 
"political"  in  the  sense  defined  above.  The  defi- 
nition includes  not  only  the  State  qua  association, 
and  the  various  less  extensive  regional  and  local 
authorities  operating  as  political  bodies  within  the 
geographical  area  included  in  a  State,  but  also,  as 
we  shall  see,  in  a  secondary  sense,  many  other  forms 


68  SOCIAL  THEORY 

of  association  which  are  also  "political"  in  their 
interest — a  political  party  or  society  or  any  bodies 
concerned  with  the  advocacy  of  any  form  of  political 
doctrine  or  policy.  Parliament,  and  the  County 
Borough  of  Smethwick,  in  so  far  as  they  are  asso- 
ciations, fall,  in  this  classification,  under  the  same 
heading  as  the  Liberal  Party  or  the  Anti- Vaccina- 
tion League. 

A  vocational  association  may  be  defined  as  an 
association  consisting  of  persons  who  are  and  whose 
purpose  or  interest  in  the  association  is  directly  and 
primarily  concerned  with  the  production,  distribu- 
tion or  exchange  of  some  commodity,  or  the  render- 
ing of  some  service,  or  with  some  question  or  course 
of  action  directly  subordinate  to  one  or  more  of 
these  interests.  It  thus  includes  the  whole  range  of 
professional  and  occupational  association,  from  that 
of  manual  workers  to  that  of  technicians  and  ex- 
perts, and  to  that  of  employers  and  traders  and  capi- 
talists. A  Trade  Union,  a  professional  institute  or 
society,  an  Employers'  Association,  a  Limited  Com- 
pany, the  British  Empire  Producers'  Organization, 
the  British  Medical  Association,  and  the  National 
Union  of  Teachers  are  all  instances  of  vocational 
association. 

It  will  have  been  noticed  that,  in  the  preliminary 
list  of  the  main  forms  of  association  under  this 
classification,  vocational  association  was  specially 
linked  with  another  form,  which,  for  want  of  a  bet- 
ter word,  I  am  forced  to  call  appetitive.  It  must  be 
made  clear  at  once  that  the  word  is  not  used  in  any 
bad  or  derogatory  sense.  By  appetitive  associations 
I  mean  those  bodies  whose  members'  primary  con- 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         69 

cern  in  the  association  is  not,  as  in  the  case  of  voca- 
tional associations,  with  production  or  the  rendering 
of  service,  but  with  consumption  and  use,  that  is, 
with  the  securing  of  a  supply  on  fair  terms  of  the 
commodities  produced  and  the  services  rendered  by, 
or  under  the  auspices  of,  vocational  associations. 
The  consumers'  Cooperative  Movement,  the  Rail- 
way Season-Ticket  Holders'  Association,  the  Com- 
mercial Gas  Users'  Association,  and  the  Parents' 
National  Educational  Union  are  all  examples  of  ap- 
petitive association.  This  form,  it  will  readily  be 
seen,  is  mainly  complementary  to  vocational  associa- 
tion, the  two  forms  corresponding  to  the  double  re- 
lations of  buying  and  selling,  demand  and  supply,  re- 
ceiving and  giving.  Different  schools  of  social 
propagandists  lay  very  different  stresses  upon  the 
relative  importance  of  these  two  complementary 
forms  of  association. 

It  is  perhaps  necessary  barely  to  notice  here  a 
point  which  will  be  more  fully  dealt  with  in  later 
chapters.  There  are  certain  schools  of  thought 
which  regard  the  State,  and  with  it  the  local  author- 
ities, as  primarily  associations  of  consumers  and 
users,  that  is  to  say  as,  in  our  sense,  appetitive  asso- 
ciations. Similarly,  some  schools  of  Communists 
regard  the  Commune  as  primarily  an  association  of 
producers  and  service  Tenderers,  that  is,  in  our  sense, 
a  vocational  association.  These  theories  lead  directly 
to  different  views  as  to  the  proper  constitution  of 
State  or  Commune;  but,  as  they  do  not  affect  our 
present  classification,  consideration  of  them  can  be 
postponed  till  a  later  stage. 

We  come  next  to  those  forms  of  association  which 


70  SOCIAL  THEORY 

can  be  called  religious.  These  include  not  only  or- 
ganized Churches  and  Connections,  but  also  propa- 
gandist movements  which  aim  at  securing  a  religious 
object,  such  as  the  "Life  and  Liberty  Movement" 
within  the  Church  of  England.  As  we  shall  have 
much  more  to  say  of  them  later,  they  need  not  de- 
tain us  here. 

The  next  important  form  of  association  is  the 
provident,  in  which  a  number  of  persons  join  to- 
gether for  mutual  assistance,  whether  under  a  defi- 
nite scheme  of  contributions  and  benefits  for  certain 
purposes,  or  for  a  less  rigid  and  definite  form  of 
mutual  help  or  beneficence.  A  Friendly  Society,  or 
other  mutual  insurance  associations,  whether  among 
workers  or  among  capitalists  in  a  particular  trade 
(e.g.  shipping),  or  among  teachers  or  clergymen,  or 
on  a  basis  which  takes  no  account  of  occupation, 
falls  under  this  head.  Many  Insurance  Companies 
are,  of  course,  not  provident  and  mutual,  but  profit- 
making  concerns,  which  belong  to  the  sphere  of  vo- 
cational organization ;  but  the  great  Friendly  Socie- 
ties with  their  millions  of  members  afford  a  large- 
scale  example  of  real  provident  associations.  Trade 
Unions  also  are,  of  course,  in  their  aspect  of  benefit 
societies,  assignable  to  this  class  of  association. 

Closely  allied  to  provident  associations  in  certain 
respects,  though  very  different  from  them  in  others, 
are  the  many  associations  which  exist  not  for  the 
securing  of  benefits  for  their  own  members,  but  for 
the  conferring  of  benefits  on  other  people.  Charit- 
able Societies  of  whatever  type,  whether  they  actu- 
ally confer  benefits  or  merely  meddle  with  other  peo- 
ple's affairs,  and  associations  which  deal  with  moral 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         71 

rather  than  material  benefits  for  others,  can  be 
grouped  together  under  this  head.  Philanthropic 
will  serve  for  a  name  for  this  very  mixed  class. 

Next  conies  what  is  perhaps  the  largest  of  all 
groups  of  associations,  those  of  a  purely  or  mainly 
sociable  character.  These  are  found  in  their  pure 
form  in  the  vast  number  of  football  clubs,  cricket 
clubs,  athletic  associations,  whist  clubs,  dancing 
clubs,  workmen's  clubs,  "clubmen's"  clubs,  night 
clubs,  and  all  the  other  types  of  associations  devoted 
purely  to  objects  of  sport,  recreation  and  sociability. 
Mixed  forms  are  also  frequently  found.  Constitu- 
tional Clubs,  Liberal  Clubs,  Labor  Clubs  and  many 
others  are  sociable  in  character,  but  are  confined 
to  persons  holding  similar  opinions,  and  partake 
in  some  small  degree  of  the  nature  of  political  as- 
sociations. Purely  sociable  associations  often  fed- 
erate with  other  associations  of  the  same  kind;  but 
generally  speaking  they  are,  if  their  federations  and 
tournaments  are  included,  sufficient  unto  themselves. 
Except  when  licensing  or  gaming  laws  are  under 
consideration,  or  some  particularly  ardent  campaign 
for  public  morality  is  in  progress,  they  mix  little, 
as  a  rule,  in  the  affairs  of  Society. 

All  the  forms  of  association  mentioned  above  are 
in  a  definite  sense  practical  and  aim  at  the  taking 
of  certain  overt  forms  of  action,  whether  adminis- 
trative propagandist,  or  purely  recreative.  This  is 
not  the  case  with  the  only  remaining  form  of  asso- 
ciation with  which  we  shall  here  concern  ourselves, 
the  theoretical  form.  This  includes  learned  and  sci- 
entific societies  of  every  type,  whatever  their  object 
of  study  and  discussion.  As  learning  and  science 


72  SOCIAL  THEORY 

have  a  definite  bearing  on  many  practical  affairs, 
theoretic  associations  often  tend  to  approximate  to 
one  or  another  of  the  practical  types,  or  to  possess 
a  mixed  character.  Moreover,  vocational  associa- 
tions, especially  among  technicians  concerned  with  a 
common  body  of  knowledge,  often  pursue  theoreti- 
cal as  well  as  practical  ends.  Many  discuss  both  the 
economic  and  other  claims  of  their  members  and  the 
status  of  their  profession,  and  also  the  theoretic 
aspects  of  the  science  which  they  profess.  Again, 
the  close  relation  between  industry  and  science  gives 
rise  to  associations,  half  practical  and  half  theo- 
retical, concerned  with  the  application  of  scientific 
results  and  methods  to  industrial  problems.  The 
numerous  Industrial  Research  Associations  which 
have  sprung  up  in  recent  years  are  examples  of  this 
hybrid  form. 

So  far  we  have  been  following  entirely  the  first 
of  the  two  principles  of  classification  with  which 
we  set  out — and  distinguishing  associations  accord- 
ing to  the  content  of  their  respective  interests.  We 
have  now  to  take  up  our  other  principle,  and  to 
survey  associations  briefly  according  to  their  method 
of  operation..  We  saw,  in  speaking  of  political, 
and  again  of  religious,  associations,  that  they  in- 
cluded not  only  such  bodies  as  States  and  Churches 
respectively,  but  also  all  manner  of  other  societies, 
the  content  of  whose  purpose  was  political  or  re- 
ligious. Our  second  principle  will  make  plain  the 
difference  between,  say,  a  State  and  a  political 
party,  or  the  Church  of  England  and  the  "Life 
and  Liberty  Movement"  which  aims  at  its  regenera- 
tion. The  difference  in  both  those  cases  is  that 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         73 

States  and  Churches  are  alike  mainly  administrative, 
whereas  political  parties  and  movements  among 
Churchmen  are  mainly  propagandist. 

By  an  administrative  association  I  mean  an  asso- 
ciation which  is  primarily  concerned,  not  with  the 
advocacy  of  any  particular  opinion,  but  with  the 
doing  of  some  particular  job,  the  arranging  and 
conducting  of  some  particular  part  of  the  work 
which  has  to  be  done  in  Society.  This  work  may 
be  done  in  many  different  ways  and  with  many 
varying  degrees  of  success.  Thus  the  State  may 
be  governed  by  the  Unionist  Party,  the  Liberal 
Party,  or  the  Labor  Party,  or  by  a  Coalition;  but 
the  primary  concern  of  the  State  is  not  with  Tory- 
ism or  Liberalism  or  Labor,  but  with  the  doing  of 
certain  definite  jobs — with  the  work  to  be  done, 
and  not  with  the  days  of  doing  it. 

All  the  forms  of  association  mentioned  in  our 
previous  classification  include  administrative  asso- 
ciations, which  are  indeed  primary  in  every  group. 
Not  only  States  and  Churches,  but  also  Trade 
Unions,  Limited  Companies,  cricket  clubs,  Friendly 
Societies,  charitable  associations,  scientific  societies, 
Cooperative  Societies  and  the  rest  are  principally 
administrative  in  function,  that  is  to  say,  they 
exist  not  for  the  spreading  of  opinion,  but  for  the 
doing  of  things.  In  a  very  real  sense,  administra- 
tive associations  are  primary,  where  propagandist 
associations  are  only  secondary,  and  it  is  among  the 
administrative  associations  that  we  shall  fine  the  es- 
sential social  associations  of  which  we  are  in  search. 

Propagandist  associations  have  already  been  de- 
fined by  inference.  They  are  those  associations 


74  SOCIAL  THEORY 

which  exist  not  so  much  for  the  doing  of  a  par- 
ticular job,  as  for  advocating  that  the  job  should 
be  done  in  a  particular  way,  that  a  particular  policy 
or  constitution  should  be  adopted  by  the  primary 
association  concerned  with  the  doing  of  it.  Propa- 
gandist associations  are  secondary,  because  they 
exist,  not  in  order  to  do  things  themselves,  but  to 
persuade  primary  associations  and  individuals  into 
a  particular  course  of  action.  There  is  thus  a  sense 
in  which  they  aim  at  their  own  extinction;  for, 
when  their  policy  is  completely  adopted,  they  cease 
to  have  a  reason  for  existence,  unless  they  find  a  new 
policy  or  remain  in  being  in  order  to  see  that  the 
results  already  achieved  are  maintained.  They  may, 
as  a  whole,  be  very  necessary  to  Society ;  .but  no 
particular  propagandist  association  is  essential  to 
the  structure  of  Society. 

Of  course,  I  am  not  denying  that  all  associations, 
however  propagandist,  possess,  in  a  secondary 
sense,  an  administrative  character,  or  that  most 
administrative  associations  also  partake,  in  a  similar 
sense,  of  the  propagandist  character.  But  the  dis- 
tinction none  the  less  holds;  for  the  fact  that  no 
association  at  all  can  exist  without  being  confronted 
by  internal  administrative  problems  does  not  make 
the  main  purpose  of  the  association  administrative. 
Similarly,  the  fact  that  an  association  engages  in 
certain  forms  of  propagandist  activity  does  not  give 
it  a  propagandist  character.  The  projected  estab- 
lishment of  a  Propaganda  Department  of  State 
would  not  make  the  State  a  mainly  propagandist 
association. 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  pursue  rather  further 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         75 

our  quest  of  the  essential  forms  of  social  associa- 
tion, not  necessarily  those  essential  for  all  time,  but 
those  essential  in  our  own  day  and  civilization.  It 
has  already  been  made  clear  that  the  term  "essen- 
tial" is  not  meant  simply  to  imply  any  moral  valua- 
tion, and  that  it  is  purely  social  essentiality  with 
which  we  are  here  concerned.  The  key  to  essential- 
ity is  thus  the  performance  of  some  function  which 
is  vital  to  the  coherent  working  of  Society,  and  with- 
out which  Society  would  be  lop-sided  or  incomplete. 
We  have  seen  that  no  particular  propagandist  asso- 
ciation can  be  regarded  as  essential  in  this  sense ;  for, 
although  propaganda  performs  a  highly  desirable 
function  in  keeping  individuals  and  associations  "up 
to  the  scratch,"  they  are  not  themselves  concerned 
with  the  direct  execution  of  vital  social  functions. 
Propagandist  association  in  general  is,  no  doubt,  es- 
sential; but  no  particular  propagandist  association 
can  claim  essentiality  except  under  one  condition. 

This  condition  is  the  atrophy  or  perversion  of  an 
essential  administrative  association  or  institution. 
Where  this  occurs,  and  the  administrative  body  fails 
to  perform  its  function,  propagandist  organization 
may  be,  for  the  moment,  the  only  way  of  recalling 
it  to  its  function  or,  failing  that,  calling  a  new 
body  into  being  in  its  place.  The  propagandist 
association  is  not,  and  can  hardly  become,  this 
new  body;  but  it  may  be  temporarily  essential  as  a 
means. 

This,  however,  is  only  a  partial  exception  to  a 
rule  which  holds  good  in  general.  It  is  among 
administrative  associations  that  the  essential  forms 
must  be  sought.  But  not  all  such  forms  of  associa- 


76  SOCIAL  THEORY 

tion  are  essential.  Society  can  do  without  any  par- 
ticular form  of  sociable  association,  as  it  can  do 
without  any  propagandist  association,  and  although 
it  cannot  do  without  sociable  association  as  a  whole. 
The  same  applies  to  provident  and  philanthropic  and 
also  to  theoretic  associations.  Religious  association, 
on  the  other  hand,  must  probably  be  regarded  as 
essential  to  almost  every  existing  Society,  because 
religion  as  a  personal  emotion  and  belief  is  widely 
diffused  in  almost  every  existing  community.  The 
position  of  religious  associations  in  Society  is,  how- 
ever, as  we  shall  see  later,  peculiar  because  of  their 
fundamentally  and  exclusively  spiritual  function.1 

We  are  left  with  the  three  forms  of  political, 
vocational  and  appetitive  association.  Each  of  these 
must,  I  think,  be  regarded  as  essential.  Each  deals 
with  a  vital  aspect  of  Social  organization,  with  an 
"interest"  vital  to  the  mass  of  the  members  of  the 
community,  and  each  is  based  upon  a  deep-rooted 
and  vital  instinct  of  association.  It  is  mainly  on  the 
right  relationship  of  these  three  forms  of  association 
that  the  coherent  organization  of  Society  depends. 
I  cannot  hope  to  make  this  point  absolutely  clear  at 
the  present  stage;  but  I  believe  that  it  will  emerge 
with  increasing  clearness  in  the  course  of  subsequent 
chapters. 

Even  if  we  hold  that  a  particular  form  of  associa- 
tion is  essential,  this  is  not  by  itself  enough  to  es- 
tablish the  essentiality  of  any  single  association  be- 
longing to  that  class.  Within  each  of  the  essential 
forms  we  may  expect  to  find,  in  any  particular  stage 
of  social  development,  certain  actual  associations 
'See  Chapter  XI. 


77 

which  can  be  regarded  as  essential ;  but,  in  order  to 
establish  this,  it  is  necessary  to  consider  not  only  the 
form  of  any  association  in  question,  but  also  its 
particular  content  and  the  motives  which  animate 
its  members  in  their  common  action.  Not  every 
association  which  is  administrative  in  character  and 
political  in  content  is  sufficiently  important  to  merit 
the  character  of  essentiality.  For  this  it  must  have 
a  particular  function  which  is  vital  enough  to  sub- 
stantiate its  claim.  Thus,  the  State  may  be  an 
essential  association;  but,  to  take  an  extreme  in- 
stance, it  is  by  no  means  clear  that  the  unnatural 
aggregation  which  we  call  a  Rural  District  Council 
can  claim  the  same  privilege.  Again,  in  the  voca- 
tional sphere,  it  is  essential  that  producers  should  be 
organized;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  each  par- 
ticular Trade  Union  or  Employers'  Association  can 
claim  essentiality.  The  final  test  of  essentiality  is 
practical,  and  cannot  be  made  by  any  abstract  or 
scientific  procedure. 

There  is,  however,  one  further  important  test  to 
which  associations  for  essentiality  can  be  subjected. 
In  our  preliminary  discussion  of  the  nature  of  as- 
sociation,1 we  attempted  a  distinction  between  dif- 
ferent types  of  motive  which  animate  men  in  asso- 
ciation. We  drew  a  distinction  between  "several" 
and  "associative"  motives,  and  discussed  in  some 
detail  .the  bearings  of  this  distinction  on  the  social 
import  of  associations.  We  saw  that  "associative" 
wants  and  motives  far  more  easily  engendered  a 
sense  of  community  than  "several"  wants,  and  there- 
fore gave  the  association  animated  by  them  a  higher 
1  See  ante,  p.  34. 


78  SOCIAL  THEORY 

status  and  made  it,  so  far,  a  greater  factor  in  the 
making  of  Society.  Our  subsequent  examination 
of  the  main  forms  of  association  has  placed  us  in  a 
position  to  appreciate  more  fully  the  bearing  of  this 
distinction  upon  social  theory,  and  also  to  develop 
it  somewhat  further. 

The  mere  fact  that  an  association  is  animated 
mainly  by  truly  "associative"  motives  and  interests 
is  not  enough  to  establish  the  fact  that  it  is  fulfilling 
a  useful  function  in  Society.  For  the  "associative" 
want  which  it  seeks  to  fulfill,  however  "associative" 
it  may  be,  is  so  far  only  a  want  of  the  members  of 
the  association,  and  may  still  be  contrary  to  the 
general  interest  of  the  community.  An  "associa- 
tively"  motived  association,  therefore,  is  not  neces- 
sarily a  socially  useful  association.  But  as  it  is  the 
case  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  general  social 
well-being,  it  is  clear  that  the  interests  of  the 
members  of  a  community  do  run  together  more 
than  they  clash.  The  members  of  a  community 
have,  ex  hypothesi,  a  sense  of  unity  and  social  re- 
lationship, and,  while  they  often  organize  in  groups 
which  are  opposed  on  particular  points,  there  is 
a  prima  facie  reason  for  supposing  that,  in  the  ma- 
jority of  cases,  where  they  cooperate  on  an  associa- 
tive basis  for  the  fulfilling  of  a  want  which  they 
can  only  enjoy  in  common,  the  fulfillment  of  that 
want  is  in  the  general  interest.  Moreover,  as  the 
community  can  only  find  an  organized  expression — 
even  so  always  a  partial  expression — through  social 
associations  and  institutions,  it  is  clear  that  asso- 
ciations based  on  an  associative  want  must  be  the 
main  ingredients  in  the  Society.  In  them,  men 


THE  FORMS  OF  ASSOCIATION         79 

learn  to  cooperate  closely  and  constantly;  and  close 
and  constant  cooperation  in  the  joint  fulfillment  of  a 
common  object,  though  it  is  not  necessarily  to  be 
identified  with  the  fulfillment  of  a  socially  useful 
function,  is  the  chief  means  by  which  men  can  learn 
how  to  fulfill  such  functions. 

It  is  not,  however,  generally  possible  to  discrimi- 
nate sharply  between  associations  or  forms  of  asso- 
ciations, and  to  say  that  in  this  association  or  form 
the  basis  is  purely  "several,"  and  in  the  other,  purely 
"associative."  Almost  every  association  is,  as  we 
have  seen,  a  medley  of  different  motives,  and  is 
partly  "several,"  and  only  in  part  truly  "associa- 
tive." But,  in  proportion  as  an  association  finds 
and  fulfills  its  function  in  Society,  the  "associative" 
basis  tends  to  become  predominant,  and  the  mo- 
tive of  "severalty"  sinks  into  the  background.  The 
best  instance  I  can  find  of  this  may  strike  many 
readers  as  being  highly  controversial;  but  I  cite  as 
clearly  illustrating  my  meaning  and  expressing  my 
own  profound  belief.  A  Trade  Union  used  to  be 
defined  as  "a  continuous  association  of  wage-earners 
for  the  purpose  of  maintaining  or  improving  their 
conditions  of  employment."  Such  a  definition  al- 
most implies  the  complete  dominance  of  "severalty" 
in  the  motives  animating  the  members  of  the  asso- 
ciation. But,  in  our  own  day,  whatever  its  justifica- 
tion in  the  past,  this  definition  has  become  clearly 
inadequate;  for  the  increasing  tendency  of  Trade 
Unionists  to  claim  for  their  associations  not  merely 
better  conditions,  but  a  definite  place  in  the  control 
of  industry,  plainly  implies  an  emergence  of  truly 
"associative"  motives,  and,  in  my  own  opinion,  rep- 


80  SOCIAL  THEORY 

resents  a  substantial  development  of  Trade  Union- 
ism towards  the  performance  of  its  proper  social 
function. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  it  is  clear  that,  as  an  association 
changes  and  develops,  it  may  change  its  motives 
as  well  as  its  purposes,  and  may  pass  from  a  stage  in 
which  "severalty"  is  predominant  to  one  in  which 
it  is  mainly  actuated  by  "associative"  motives.  This 
is  an  indication,  though  it  is  not  a  proof,  that  the 
association  is  moving  towards  the  discovery  of  its 
true  function  in  Society. 

This  chapter  has  dealt  entirely  with  the  forms 
and  motives  of  association,  and  has  only  once  or 
twice  cursorily  mentioned  the  working  of  institu- 
tions as  distinct  from  associations.  I  have  made 
this  omission  advisedly,  not  because  institutions  are 
not  important,  but  because  we  have  not  yet  reached 
the  stage  at  which  it  is  possible  to  deal  adequately 
with  them.  This  we  shall  be  able  to  do  only  when 
we  liave  examined  successively  the  political,  voca- 
tional and  appetitive  (especially  the  economic),  and 
religious  structure  of  Society,  in  which  institutions 
mainly  appear.  Upon  this  part  of  our  inquiry  we 
can  now  embark  without  further  delay. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   STATE 

WHAT  is  the  State?  And  what  is  its  function 
in  Society  and  in  the  community?  These 
questions  appear  to  us  already  in  a  different 
light  from  that  in  which  they  appear  in  most  books 
on  Social  Theory.  They  are  still  vital  problems; 
but  they  are  no  longer  the  center  of  the  whole 
problem  of  community.  The  State,  however  im- 
portant, is  and  can  be  for  us  no  more  than  the 
greatest  and  most  permanent  association  or  in- 
stitution in  Society,  and  its  claim  even  to 
any  such  position  will  have  to  be  carefully  con- 
sidered. 

We  must  bear  in  mind  throughout  our  considera- 
tion that  it  is  not  a  question  of  The  State,  a  sin- 
gle unique  entity  existing  alone  in  a  circumambient 
void,  but  of  "States"  existing  in  many  different 
communities  at  different  stages  of  development,  and 
entering  into  the  most  varied  relationships  one  with 
another.  When  we  speak  of  "the  State,"  therefore, 
we  are  only  using  a  class-name  to  which  we  can 
attach  our  generalizations  as  predicates.  We  are 
ignoring  non-essential  differences  between  one  State 
and  another,  and  concentrating  on  those  essential 
characteristics  which  States  have  in  common. 

81 


82  SOCIAL  THEORY 

This,  however,  is  to  give  too  inclusive  and  gen- 
eralized a  scope  to  our  treatment  of  the  subject. 
Although  we  shall  sometimes  be  referring  to  char- 
acteristics common  to  all  States  at  all  times  and 
stages  of  development,  we  shall  be  using  in  the  main 
for  purposes  of  illustration  "the  modern  State," 
that  is,  the  States  which  exist  in  our  own  time  and 
stage  of  civilization.  Taking  the  nature  common 
to  these  States  as  our  basis,  we  shall  attempt  to 
arrive,  from  the  study  of  their  common  nature, 
at  some  conception  of  their  true  function  in  the 
Society  of  to-day  and  to-morrow.  Further  than 
that  we  can  hardly  hope  to  go;  for  a  new  genera- 
tion and  a  new  degree  of  social  development  will 
inevitably  call  for  a  restatement  of  social  theory. 

Let  us  begin  with  a  brief  summary  and  analysis  of 
the  principal  activities  of  the  modern  State,  that  is, 
of  the  States  which  exist  in  civilized  communities  in 
the  world  of  to-day.  Here,  again,  it  would,  of 
course,  be  useful  to  attempt  a  complete  and  ex- 
haustive enumeration.  Nor  is  it  necessary  to  our 
purpose,  which  is  only  that  of  securing  sufficient  ma- 
terial to  work  upon  in  our  attempt  to  discover  the 
State's  function  in  the  Society  of  to-day.  As  we 
saw  in  our  discussion  of  the  principle  of  function,  it 
is  far  from  being  the  case  that  every  actual  activity 
of  the  State  forms  a  part  of  its  social  function;  but 
it  is  the  case  that  the  function  of  the  State  can  only 
be  sought  among  activities  which  the  State  does,  in 
some  degree,  already  exercise.  In  order  to  discover 
the  function  of  the  State,  it  is  therefore  necessary  to 
adopt  a  double  procedure.  We  have  first  to  ex- 
amine, and  select  from,  the  actual  activities  of  the 


THE  STATE  83 

State  those  which  are,  prima  facie,  essential,  and  we 
have  then  to  examine  the  fundamental  nature  and 
constitution  of  the  State  with  a  view  to  determining 
which  of  these  essential  activities  can  be  regarded 
as  belonging  to  its  function. 

It  is  a  commonplace  observation  that  during  the 
last  two  generations  at  least  the  activities  of  the 
State  have  been  undergoing  constant  and  rapid  mul- 
tiplication and  expansion.  Moreover,  it  is  gener- 
ally recognized  that  this  expansion  has  been  far 
more  extensive  in  the  economic  than  in  any  other 
sphere.  When  Locke  wrote  his  Treatises  on  Civil 
Government,  interpreting  in  them  the  ideas  and  so- 
cial situation  of  the  English  Revolution  of  1688-9, 
it  was  still  easy  to  regard  the  function  of  the  State 
as  strictly  specific  and  limited,  because  its  actual 
activities  were  in  the  main  specific  and  limited,  and 
were  in  process  of  actual  construction.  To-day, 
whatever  may  be  the  true  function  of  the  State, 
there  is  an  undeniable  temptation  to  conclude,  on  the 
basis  of  its  actual  activities,  that  its  functions  are 
practically  universal  and  unlimited.  Such  a  con- 
clusion, whether  it  be  right  or  wrong,  at  least  goes 
with  the  grain  of  present-day  Society.  Yet  it  may 
be  that  Locke  was  nearer  to  being  right  than  those 
social  theorists  who  are  ready  to  conclude,  because 
the  State  does  everything  in  fact,  that  its  social 
function  is  pantopragmatic  and  universal. 

To-day,  almost  every  developed  State  is  cease- 
lessly active  in  economic  affairs.  It  passes  Factory 
Acts,  and  other  legislation  designed  to  ensure  a 
minimum  of  protection  to  the  workers  engaged  in 
production:  it  regulates  wages  and  hours:  it  at- 


84  SOCIAL  THEORY 

tempts  to  provide  for  and  against  unemployment: 
it  intervenes,  successfully  or  unsuccessfully,  in  in- 
dustrial disputes:  it  compels  employers  to  provide 
compensation  for  accidents,  and  both  employers 
and  workers  to  contribute  to  social  insurance  funds 
which  it  administers.  On  the  other  hand,  it  regu- 
lates to  some  extent  the  commercial  operations  of 
financiers  and  employers,  restricts  or  pretends  to 
restrict  trusts  and  profiteering,  uses  its  consular 
service  and  special  agents  to  aid  foreign  trade,  en- 
courages, subsidizes  and  assists  in  industrial  re- 
search, enact  laws  affecting,  and  enters  into  many 
formal  and  informal  relationships  with  capitalist  in- 
terests and  associations.  Moreover,  more  and  more 
it  embarks  itself  upon  economic  enterprises,  con- 
ducts a  Post  Office  or  a  railway  service,  and  be- 
comes the  direct  employer  of  vast  numbers  of  its 
own  citizens,  incidentally  often  imposing  political 
and  other  disqualifications  upon  them  on  the  ground 
that  they  are  State  employees. 

To  all  this  industrial  and  commercial  activity  of 
the  national  State  must  be  added  the  no  less  com- 
plex activities  of  local  authorities  acting  under  the 
laws  enacted  by  the  State — municipal  and  other  lo- 
cal by-laws  regulating  industry  and  commerce,  and 
the  extending  operations  of  "municipal  trading." 
It  will,  however,  be  more  convenient  to  consider 
the  character  and  activities  of  local  authorities  sepa- 
rately at  a  later  stage,  although  no  clear  or  hard 
and  fast  line  can  be  drawn  between  a  State  and  a 
local  authority  in  those  cases  where  "federal,"  "Do- 
minion" or  even  "regionalist"  forms  of  government 
exist. 


THE  STATE  85 

There  is  a  further  economic  activity  of  the  State 
which  is  more  and  more  becoming  manifest  in  our 
own  day.  Taxation  is,  in  its  origin,  merely  a  method 
of  collecting  from  individuals  that  proportion  of 
their  incomes  which  must  be  diverted  from  their  per- 
sonal use  to  meet  the  necessary  expenses  of  State 
administration.  But,  as  the  activities  of  the  State 
expand,  taxation  shows  a  marked  tendency  to  be- 
come also  a  method  of  redistributing  incomes  within 
the  community.  This  new  tendency  emerges  already 
in  systems  of  graduated  taxation;  but  it  becomes 
the  leading  principle  in  those  proposals,  nowhere  yet 
carried  far  into  effect,  which  aim  at  its  definite  and 
deliberate  use  as  a  means  to  at  least  comparative 
equality  of  income.1 

Apart  from  taxation  for  administrative  purposes, 
the  present  economic  activities  of  the  State  are 
largely  of  recent  growth.  This  is  not  to  say  that 
the  State  had  not  previously  engaged  in  economic 
action  on  a  large  scale,  as  for  instance  under  what  is 
known  as  the  "Mercantile  System."  But  between 
the  "Mercantile  System"  and  the  economic  activity 
of  the  modern  State  intervenes  in  many  cases  a 
period  of  comparative  inactivity — laissez  faire — fol- 
lowing upon  the  changes  caused  by  the  Industrial 
Revolution.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  when  economic 
activities  were  largely  in  the  hands  of  the  Guilds, 
and  in  the  period  of  the  Industrial  Revolution,  when 
they  were  largely  in  the  hands  of  competitive  capi- 

1  The  State  Bonus  Scheme,  actively  advocated  by  Mr.  Dennis 
Milner  and  his  colleagues  of  the  State  Bonus  League,  is  an 
advanced  example  of  this  tendency.  It  is  a  definite  proposal 
for  a  redistribution  by  the  State,  on  a  basis  of  equality,  of  a 
considerable  proportion  of  the  communal  income. 


86  SOCIAL  THEORY 

talists,  the  State's  intervention  in  economic  matters 
was,  comparatively,  very  restricted  indeed. 

Extensive  as  the  economic  activities  of  the  State 
are,  it  will  be  agreed  that  they  have  not  yet,  in  any 
actual  State,  reached  an  essentially  central  position. 
This  might  occur,  and  would  probably  occur  if  the 
pure  Collectivists  had  their  way;  but,  for  the  pres- 
ent, the  central  position  is  still  occupied  by  politi- 
cal and  coordinating  rather  than  by  economic  ac- 
tivities, although  the  latter  constantly  threaten  the 
position  of  the  two  former.  Our  next  inquiry  must 
be  into  the  nature  of  the  political  activities  of  the 
State. 

The  word  "political"  is  one  round  which  a  high 
degree  of  ambiguity  has  gathered.  It  has  very  va- 
rious associations,  with  the  n6Xis,  or  City-State, 
of  the  Greeks,  with  the  modern  Nation-State,  with 
the  whole  complex  of  social  action,  with  purely 
party  and  parliamentary  activities,  and  so  forth. 
Here  I  am  using  the  word  in  a  definite  and  specific 
sense.  I  mean  by  political  activities  those  activi- 
ties which  are  concerned  with  the  social  regulation 
of  those  personal  relationships  which  arise  directly 
out  of  the  fact  that  men  live  together  in  communi- 
ties, and  which  are  susceptible  to  direct  social  or- 
ganization.1 

In  this,  as  in  many  other  cases,  it  is  easier  and 
perhaps  more  illuminating,  to  illustrate  than  to  de- 
fine. What,  we  must  ask,  are  the  main  types  of 
actual  political  activity  exercised  by  the  State  ? 

Marriage  is  at  once  a  civil  and  a  religious  institu- 
tion. The  State  regulates  the  relations  between  in- 
1  See  ante,  p.  67,  for  political  association. 


THE  STATE  87 

dividuals  by  enacting  laws  dealing  with  marriage 
and  its  dissolution,  the  care  of  children,  the  conduct 
arising  out  of  sexual  relationships  in  all  their  forms. 
It  makes  laws  for  the  prevention  and  punishment  of 
crime,  for  the  care  and  treatment  of  lunatics,  the 
feeble-minded  and  others  who  are  not  in  a  position 
to  look  after  themselves.  It  is  vitally  concerned 
with  many  relationships  quite  apart  from  sex  crime 
or  abnormality,  and  constantly  lays  down  rules  of 
convenience  and  convention  for  the  guidance  of  men 
in  their  mutual  relationships.  If  it  covers  any  con- 
siderable area  or  includes  any  large  number  of  in- 
habitants, it  must  recognize  or  establish  local  au- 
thorities similar  to  itself  but  with  more  limited 
powers,  and  makes  general  rules  for  the  guidance  of 
these  bodies  in  their  various  activities.  In  fact,  it 
is  concerned  mainly  with  personal  rights  and  the 
means  of  reconciling  them,  and  with  those  limita- 
tions of  personal  conduct  which  are  essential  to  the 
existence  of  a  coordinated  system  of  personal 
rights. 

Where  classes  exist  in  the  community,  the  State 
often  exercises  further  political  activity  in  sustain- 
ing, recognizing,  and  modifying  class  privileges  and 
class  exclusions.  It  creates,  say,  a  peerage,  and 
from  time  to  time  elevates  the  latest  exalted  servant 
of  the  public, .or  newspaper  proprietor,  or  nouveau 
riche,  to  membership  of  the  peerage.  It  enacts  spe- 
cial privileges  for  one  class  or  another,  or  passes 
special  legislature  discriminating  against  a  class. 
In  the  extreme  case,  its  political  activity  assumes 
the  form  of  a  class  dictatorship.  This  is  the  bad 
side  of  the  State's  political  activity. 


88  SOCIAL  THEORY 

Thirdly,  the  State  of  to-day  possesses  increasingly 
important  activities  of  coordination.  It  is  largely 
concerned  in  adjusting  the  relations  between  asso- 
ciation and  association,  or  institution  and  institution, 
or  institution  and  association,  or  between  other  as- 
sociations or  institutions  and  itself.  It  enacts  laws 
regulating  the  form  and  scope  of  associative  ac- 
tivity, friendly  society  law,  law  affecting  banks, 
companies,  partnerships,  Trade  Unions,  clubs,  as- 
sociations of  any  and  every  sort.  In  some  degree, 
it  regulates  all  religious  associations,  and,  in  some 
countries,  the  existence  of  an  Established  Church 
considerably  increases  the  extent  of  its  religious 
intervention.  There  is  one  theory  of  the  State 
which  regards  it  as  primarily  a  coordinating  body, 
devoted  not  to  any  specific  functions  of  its  own, 
but  to  the  coordinating  of  the  various  functional 
associations  within  Society.1 

I  do  not  claim  that  this  summary  of  the  activities 
of  States  is  exhaustive  or  inclusive,  nor  do  I  desire 
to  make  it  so.  It  can,  with  one  further  develop- 
ment, be  made  sufficient  for  our  purpose.  I  have  so 
far  dealt  almost  entirely  with  the  internal  activities 
of  "the  State,"  and  ignored  its  external  relations, 
whether  with  other  States,  or  with  anything  wholly 
or  partly  outside  its  geographical  boundaries.  I 
have  done  this  because  "international"  or- external 
activity  cannot  be  regarded  as  a  particular  province 
of  State  activity,  in  the  same  sense  as  economic, 
political  and  coordinating  activities.  International 
action  arises  in  relation  to  each  of  these  provinces  of 

1  This  view  has  been  often  expressed  in  the  columns  of  the 
New  Age,  over  the  signature  "National  Guildsmen." 


THE  STATE  89 

State  activity,  and  has,  besides,  special  problems  of 
its  own.  Thus  the  State  takes  external  economic 
action  in  the  development  of  foreign  trade,  external 
political  action  in  connection,  say,  with  international 
provisions  regarding  crime,  marriage,  naturaliza- 
tion, and  other  questions  of  personal  status  and  con- 
venience which  involve  a  measure  of  activity  tran- 
scending State  boundaries.  In  its  activity  of 
coordination,  it  is  confronted  with  the  problem  of 
international  association,  from  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  to  the  Socialist  International. 

These  forms  of  external  State  action  may  either 
lead  to  quarrels  and  disagreements  between  States, 
or  they  may  bind  States  together  and  lead  towards 
a  sort  of  super-State,  or  at  least  Society  or  League 
of  States  bound  together  for  the  performance  of 
specific  functions  or  the  exercise  of  specific  activi- 
ties. Hitherto,  the  external  actions  of  States  have 
been  far  more  fertile  in  disagreement  than  in  organ- 
ized cooperation ;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  this  will 
always  be  the  case.  Indeed,  a  proper  understand- 
ing and  adjustment  of  the  internal  functions  of  the 
State  will  be  likely  to  exercise  a  profound  and  benef- 
icent action  upon  its  relations  with  other  States, 
and  to  set  it  upon  the  road  of  organized  interna- 
tional cooperation  which  other  forms  of  associa- 
tion are  more  forward  in  following  than  the  State 
has  been  in  the  past. 

A  full  discussion  of  the  external  aspects  of  State 
action,  however,  would  be  foreign  to  our  present 
purpose,  which  is  in  the  main  that  of  disentangling 
the  true  functions  of  the  State  from  the  network  of 
its  present  activities.  By  what  test  can  we  so  test 


90  SOCIAL  THEORY 

these  activities  as  to  make  the  real  nature  and  func- 
tion of  the  State  stand  out  from  among  them  clear 
and  well-defined?  The  first  step  in  applying  our 
test  must  be  to  investigate  the  State  from  a  dif- 
ferent point  of  view,  to  regard  it  in  the  light,  not  of 
its  activities,  but  of  its  structure  and  composition. 
We  may  then  hope,  by  bringing  its  activities  into 
relation  to  its  structure,  to  discover  its  function  in 
the  complex  of  organized  Society. 

How,  then,  is  the  State  composed?  And  what 
is  its  structural  principle?  These  are  not  easy  ques- 
tions to  answer,  because  any  attempt  to  answer  them 
is  likely  to  open  at  once  large  controversial  ques- 
tions. Moreover,  the  structure  of  different  States, 
or  of  the  same  State  at  different  times,  appears 
to  be  essentially  different.  What  is  there  in  com- 
mon between  the  structure  of  a  pure  despotism,  in 
which  a  monarch  is  supposed  to  possess  absolute 
and  unlimited  power,  and  a  State  in  which  all 
power  rests,  at  any  rate  in  theory,  upon  the  consent 
and  active  cooperation  of  the  whole  body  of  the 
people  ? 

It  must  be  noted  that  the  activities  of  a  "des- 
potic" and  of  a  "democratic"  State  may  be  iden- 
tical, while  their  structural  principles  seem  to  be  vi- 
tally different.  But  are  their  structural  principles 
as  fundamentally  different  as  they  seem?  Every 
despotism  which  seeks  at  all  to  justify  its  existence 
seeks  to  do  so  on  one  or  another  of  three  princi- 
ples. Either  it  claims  to  be  based  upon  "divine 
right  and  appointment"  of  the  ruler,  or  it  claims 
to  be  acting  in  the  interests  of  the  ruled,  and  there- 
fore in  conformity  with  their  real  will,  or  it  claims 


THE  STATE  91 

to  be  based  upon  the  actual  consent  of  the  ruled, 
tacit  or  expressed.  With  despotisms  which  do  not 
seek  to  justify  their  existence  we  are  not  concerned, 
since  in  them  it  is  manifest  that  social  obligation, 
on  which  the  possibility  of  a  coherent  Society  de- 
pends, is  not  present. 

We  are  left,  then,  with  three  possible  justifica- 
tions of  despotism,  and  it  must  be  admitted  that 
all  three  finally  reduce  themselves  to  a  common 
form — the  consent,  in  one  form  or  another,  of  the 
ruled.  This  is  clear  in  the  third  form  of  the  theory 
of  despotism,  which  is  based  on  actual  consent.  In 
the  second  form,  the  consent  is  not  actual,  but  un- 
less it  is  real  and  justification  fails.  It  depends 
upon  the  metaphysical  conception  of  the  "real  will," 
different  from  the  actual  will  and  willing  always 
the  good.  It  claims,  in  fact,  to  be  the  consent 
of  the  "better  selves"  of  the  ruled.  The  third 
theory,  that  of  divine  right,  seems  at  first  sight 
to  have  nothing  to  do  with  human  consent;  but 
if  God  has  willed  that  a  man  shall  be  king,  it  is 
clear  that  the  "better  selves"  of  all  men  have  willed 
this  too,  and  that,  if  divine  right  is  established, 
universal  consent  ought  to  follow  as  a  matter  of 
course. 

Any  attempt  to  justify  a  despotic  State  therefore 
brings  us  back  to  the  same  principle  as  that  on 
which  "democratic"  States  are  usually  justified — 
the  consent  of  the  ruled.  It  is  true  that  in  a 
despotism  this  consent  cannot,  unless  the  despotic 
is  elected,  pass  beyond  acquiescence,  whereas  in 
democracy  consent  may  become,  and  in  real  democ- 
racy must  become,  active  cooperation.  Still,  a  com- 


92  SOCIAL  THEORY 

mon  ground  of  principle  has  been  established,  and 
the  State,  whatever  its  form  of  power,  is  seen  to 
rest  on  the  consent  of  those  who  are  its  citizens, 
subjects,  members  or  human  constituents. 

If  once  the  principle  of  consent  is  established  as 
the  basis  of  the  State,  it  is  impossible  to  set  limits 
to  the  operation  of  the  principle.  If  the  members 
consent  to  despotism,  well  and  good;  but  as  soon 
as  they  desire  to  assume  a  more  active  cooperation 
in  the  affairs  of  State,  they  have  clearly  a  right  to 
do  so.  The  fullest  democracy  in  action  is  only  the 
logical  development  of  the  principle  of  consent,  ex- 
panded by  the  application  of  actual  human  wills — 
that  is,  of  the  will  to  self-government.  If  this  is  so, 
we  can  safely  take  the  "democratic  State'"  as  the 
developed  form  of  "the  State,"  and  expect,  in  laying 
bare  its  structure,  to  lay  bare  the  structure  of  States 
in  general. 

The  only  obstacle  in  the  way  of  our  immediately 
adopting  this  course  is  the  metaphysical  doctrine 
of  the  real  "will" — a  doctrine  which  we  shall  again 
and  again  encounter  as  an  influence  obscuring  our 
attempt  to  study  the  character  of  social  organization. 
If  the  doctrine  of  a  real  will  different  from  any- 
body's actual  will  is  accepted,  all  arguments  for 
democracy,  that  is  government  by  the  actual  wills 
of  the  ruled,  go  by  the  board.  But  so  equally  do 
all  arguments  for  everything  else;  for  we  are  left 
without  means  of  ascertaining  the  nature  or  content 
of  this  real  will.  The  content  of  actual  wills  we 
can  know  up  to  a  point:  the  content  of  the  real 
will  we  cannot  know  at  all.  We  can  only  know 
what  we  believe  to  be  good,  and  thereupon,  by  a 


THE  STATE  93 

quite  gratuitous  assumption,  assume  our  conception 
of  the  good  to  be  the  content  of  everybody's  real 
will.  Or,  if  we  are  not  quite  sure  ourselves  that 
we  know  all  the  good,  we  can  stand  back  astonished 
at  the  magnitude  of  the  State  and  its  works,  and 
say  that  anything  so  big  must  be  good.  Many 
idealist  social  theorists  have  virtually  done  this, 
and  made  of  the  doctrine  of  the  real  will,  in  its  ap- 
plication to  social  theory,  no  more  than  a  colos- 
sally  fraudulent  justification  of  "things  as  they 
are."  x 

I  shall  content  myself  with  leaping  rather  lightly 
over  this  metaphysical  obstacle,  referring  my  read- 
ers to  the  book  of  Professor  Hobhouse,  and  reserv- 
ing the  matter  for  fuller  treatment  at  a  later  stage. 
I  shall  assume,  then,  that  actual  wills  are  real  wills, 
or  at  least  near  enough  to  reality  to  be  going  on 
with,  and  I  shall  therefore  assume  that  the  basis 
of  the  State's  structure  is  to  be  found  in  the  actual 
consent  of  its  members. 

But  here  we  encounter  our  first  real  difficulty. 
Who  are  the  members  of  the  State,  and,  indeed,  can 
the  State  be  said  to  have  any  members?  I  am 
using  the  word  "members"  because  it  is  the  most 
neutral  word  I  can  find.  We  usually  speak  of 
"citizens"  or  "subjects";  but  one  of  these  words 
has  about  it  the  implication  of  despotism  and  the 
other  that  of  the  actual  exercise  of  political  rights. 
I  therefore  avoid  them  for  the  present,  because  I 

1  For  an  excellent  onslaught  upon  some  such  theories,  see 
The  Metaphysical  Theory  of  the  State,  by  L.  T.  Hobhouse. 
For  an  awful  example  of  them,  see  the  writings  of  Dr.  Ber- 
nard Bosanquet. 


94  SOCIAL  THEORY 

want  to  avoid  equally  for  the  present  both  these 
implications. 

The  State,  as  an  association,  has  members,  and 
its  members  are  all  the  persons  ordinarily  resident 
within  the  area  within  which  the  State  ordinarily 
exercises  authority.  Such  persons  are  members  of 
the  State,  whether  or  not  they  have  votes  or  other 
political  privileges,  by  virtue  merely  of  their  ordi- 
nary residence  within  the  State  area.  For  the  State 
is,  for  the  dwellers  within  its  area,  a  compulsory 
association,  and  its  compulsory  character  is  re- 
vealed in  two  ways — in  its  power  to  compel  all  per- 
sons in  its  area,  and  in  the  right  of  all  such  per- 
sons to  membership  of  it.  When  we  say  that  the 
State  rests  upon  consent,  we  mean  that  it  rests  upon 
the  consent  of  an  effective  proportion  of  all  the 
dwellers  within  its  area. 

Membership  of  the  State  is,  however,  an  almost 
barren  theory  without  recognized  political  rights — 
for  without  such  rights  a  member  can  only  make 
his  voice  heard  in  time  of  revolution,  when  the 
ordinary  procedure  of  the  State  is  in  abeyance. 
What  right,  we  must  ask,  does  membership  of  the 
State  give  to  the  recognition  of  actual  political 
rights?  The  answer  is  partly  implied  in  what  we 
have  said  already  of  consent  as  the  basis  of  the 
State.  The  members  of  the  State  have  the  right  to 
translate  a  passive  consent  into  an  active  coopera- 
tion by  the  assumption  of  political  rights.  This 
they  habitually  do  by  gradually  extending  the  fran- 
chise and  other  political  rights  to  new  sections  of 
the  population,  as  these  sections  become  articulate 
in  advancing  their  claim.  The  logical  completion 


THE  STATE  95 

of  this  development  is  universal  suffrage  as  the  ex- 
pression of  a  political  articulateness  generally  dif- 
fused through  all  sections  of  the  people. 

I  shall  take,  then,  as  the  basis  of  examination  of 
the  structure  of  the  State,  a  State  possessing  the 
institution  of  universal  suffrage.  What  is  the  struc- 
tural principle  of  such  a  State?  Regarded  as  a 
whole,  it  is  a  compulsory  association  including  all 
the  dwellers  within  a  particular  area.  Its  basis  is 
therefore  territorial  and  inclusive,  whereas  the  basis 
of  a  Trade  Union  is  vocational  and  selective.  The 
essence  of  the  State  is  to  include  all  sorts  of  people, 
without  reference  to  the  sort  of  people  they  are, 
the  sort  of  beliefs  they  hold,  or  the  sort  of  work 
they  do. 

I  do  not  mean,  of  course,  that  there  is  not  usually 
a  very  important  element  of  identity  of  character, 
way  of  life,  and  even  occupation,  among  the  mem- 
bers of  a  particular  State.  This  element  of  identity 
is  strongest  in  the  City-State,  and  very  strong  in 
the  State  whose  area  is  the  area  of  a  Nation.  But 
it  is  not  the  essential  principle  of  the  State  form 
of  grouping.  There  are  States  which  are  not  coterm- 
inous with  Nations,  and  State  and  Nation  are 
essentially  different  things.  A  Nation  may  be  a 
community,  but  it  cannot  be,  though  it  may  pos- 
sess, a  State.  A  Nation  is  not  an  association;  a 
State  is. 

The  State,  then,  is  an  inclusive  territorial  asso- 
ciation, ignoring  differences  between  men  and  com- 
pulsorily  taking  in  every  one  who  ordinarily  dwells 
within  its  area.  This  being  its  principle,  how  can  we 


96  SOCIAL  THEORY 

discover  its  function?  The  answer  will  be  found 
by  asking  and  answering  a  further  question. 

Why  does  the  State  ignore  the  differences  between 
men  and  include  all  sorts  and  conditions,  and  what 
is  the  sphere  of  action,  or  social  function,  marked 
out  for  it  by  the  adoption  of  this  structure?  It 
ignores  the  differences  between  men  because  it  is 
concerned  not  with  their  differences,  but  with  their 
identity,  and  its  function  and  interest  are  concerned 
with  men's  identity  and  not  with  their  differences. 
Objectively  stated,  this  principle  takes  the  following 
form.  The  concern  of  the  State,  as  an  association 
including  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men,  is  with 
those  things  which  concern  all  sorts  and  conditions 
of  men,  and  concern  them,  broadly  speaking,  in  the 
same  way,  that  is,  in  relation  to  their  identity  and 
not  to  their  points  of  difference. 

The  State  exists  primarily  to  deal  with  those 
things  which  affect  all  its  members  more  or  less 
equally  and  in  the  same  way.  Let  us  try  to  see 
clearly  what  are  the  effects  of  this  principle.  It 
excludes  from  the  primary  functions  of  the  State 
— from  its  social  function  par  excellence — those 
spheres  of  social  action  which  affect  different  mem- 
bers of  it  in  different  degrees  and  in  various  ways. 
This  does  not  mean  that  the  State  must  not  concern 
itself  with  any  such  spheres  of  action,  but  only  that 
they  do  not  form  part  of  its  primary  function,  and 
may  fall  within  the  functions  of  other  forms  of  as- 
sociation. We  are  not  concerned  as  yet  so  much 
with  limiting  the  province  of  the  State  as  with  dis- 
covering what  is  its  undisputed  and  peculiar  sphere 
of  activity. 


THE  STATE  97 

Let  us  look  back  now  to  the  point  from  which  we 
set  out — to  our  brief  account  of  the  existing  activi- 
ties of  the  State.  Which  of  these  activities  clearly 
correspond  to  the  definition  we  have  just  given,  and 
are,  by  their  correspondence,  clearly  marked  out 
as  essential  activities  of  the  State.  We  divided  the 
actual  activities  of  the  State  into  three  main  di- 
visions— economic,  political  and  coordinative.  Let 
us  first  look  at  each  of  these  three  divisions  in  gen- 
eral and  as  a  whole,  proceeding  to  a  further  analysis 
of  them  as  we  find  it  to  be  required. 

Economic  activities  for  the  most  part  clearly  af- 
fect the  various  members  of  the  community  1  in  dif- 
ferent degrees  and  in  various  ways.  For  it  is  here 
that  one  of  the  most  easily  recognizable  and  organiz- 
able  differences  between  man  and  man  comes  into 
play.  Coal  mining  affects  the  coal  miner  in  quite  a 
different  way  from  that  in  which  it  affects  the  rest 
of  the  people,  and  so  through  the  whole  list  of 
trades  and  vocations.  Of  course,  coal  mining  does 
affect  not  only  the  miner,  but  also  everybody  else; 
but  the  point  is  that  it  affects  the  miner  in  a  different 
manner  and  degree. 

Here,  however,  a  difficulty  at  once  arises.  Each 
trade  or  vocation  affects  those  who  follow  it  in  a 
different  way  and  degree  from  the  way  and  degree 
in  which  it  affects  others ;  but  many  vital  industries 
and  services  do  also,  from  another  point  of  view, 
affect  almost  everybody  in  very  much  the  same  way. 

1 1  use  the  terms  "members  of  the  community"  and  "mem- 
bers of  the  State"  indifferently,  assuming  that  the  geographi- 
cal area  of  the  community  coincides  with  that  of  the  State. 
The  argument  is  not  affected. 


98  SOCIAL  THEORY 

We  must  all  eat  and  drink,  be  clothed,  housed  and 
warmed,  be  tended  in  sickness  and  educated  in 
childhood  and  youth,  and  our  common  needs  in 
these  and  other  respects  give  rise  to  a  common  rela- 
tion, that  of  consumers  or  users  of  the  products  and 
service  rendered  by  those  who  follow  the  various 
trades  and  vocations  concerned. 

It  is  upon  the  fact  that  the  Collectivist  theory  of 
the  State  is  based.  The  Collectivists,  or  State  So- 
cialists, regard  the  State  as  an  association  of  con- 
sumers, and  claim  for  it  supremacy  in  the  economic 
sphere  on  the  ground  that  consumption,  at  least  in 
relation  to  the  vital  industries  and  services,  is  a 
matter  that  concerns  everybody  equally  and  in  the 
same  way.  This,  however,  is  to  ignore  a  difference 
as  vital  as  the  identity  on  which  stress  is  laid.  The 
most  that  can  be  claimed  for  the  State  in  the  eco- 
nomic sphere  on  account  of  the  identical  interest  of 
all  the  members  of  the  community  in  consumption  is 
State  control  of  consumption,  and  not  State  control 
of  production,  in  which  the  interests  of  different 
members  of  the  community  are  vitally  different. 

The  economic  sphere  thus  falls  at  once  into  two 
separable  parts — production  and  consumption,  in 
one  of  which  all  interests  tend  to  be  identical,  while 
in  the  other,  production,  they  tend  to  be  different. 
Consumption  is  thus  marked  off  as  falling,  prima 
facie,  within  the  sphere  of  the  State,  while  produc- 
tion is  no  less  clearly  marked  off  as  falling  out- 
side it. 

We  shall  have  to  pursue  this  question  further  at 
a  later  stage,  when  we  examine  directly  the  eco- 
nomic structure  of  Society.  There  is,  however,  one 


THE  STATE  99 

question,  arising  immediately  out  of  this  distinction, 
with  which  we  must  deal  at  the  present  stage.  We 
saw  in  our  summary  of  State  activities  that  taxation 
tends  to  become,  and  to  be  regarded  as,  not  merely 
a  means  of  raising  revenue  for  public  purposes,  but 
a  means  of  redistributing  the  national  income.  May 
not  this  tendency  provide  the  key  to  the  State's 
function  in  relation  to  consumption?  If  there  is 
one  thing  in  the  economic  sphere  which  affects  every- 
body equally  and  in  the  same  way  it  is  the  question 
of  income,  on  which  the  nominal  amount  of  con- 
sumption depends.  Closely  bound  up  with  this  is 
the  question  of  price,  which,  in  its  relation  to  in- 
come, determines  the  real  amount  of  consumption. 
Income  and  prices,  then,  seem  to  fall  clearly  within 
the  province  of  the  State,  and  the  determination  of 
them  forms  an  integral  part  of  the  State's  functions. 
The  State,  then,  regulates  consumption  primarily 
through  income  and  prices.  By  these  means  it  acts 
upon  the  general  level  and  distribution  of  consump- 
tion, and  not  directly  upon  the  consumption  of  any 
particular  commodity.  It  is,  however,  clear  that, 
in  the  case  of  many  staple  commodities  and  vital 
services,  not  only  the  general  level  of  consuming 
power,  but  also  the  consumption  and  supply  of  a 
particular  commodity  or  service,  affects  everybody 
more  or  less  equally  and  in  the  same  way.  Of 
course,  there  are  many  other  commodities  whose 
consumption  affects  only  a  part  of  the  people,  or  af- 
fects different  sections  in  very  unequal  measure.  In 
such  cases  the  State  has  no  primary  function.  Hav- 
ing regulated  the  general  distribution  of  consum- 
ing power,  it  can  leave  to  ad  hoc  bodies  the  expres- 


100  SOCIAL  THEORY 

sion  of  the  consumers'  point  of  view  in  relation  to 
such  commodities  or  services. 

But  in  the  case  of  the  vital  commodities  and 
services  which,  broadly  speaking,  affect  everybody 
equally  and  in  the  same  way,  there  is  a  prima  facie 
argument  for  State  regulation,  and  it  is  clear  that 
regulation  must  be  done  either  by  the  State  or  by 
some  body  or  bodies  reproducing  its  structure  and 
similarly  based  upon  general  suffrage  and  an  in- 
clusive and  non-selective  electorate.  The  question 
whether  the  State  or  some  other  body  or  bodies  so 
constituted  should  assume  these  functions  depends 
upon  the  degree  in  which  the  combined  performance 
of  political  functions  and  of  these  specialized  eco- 
nomic functions  can  be  undertaken  with  satisfac- 
tory results  by  the  same  group  of  elected  persons, 
or  whether  it  is  necessary  that  the  same  body  of 
electors  should  choose  different  persons  and  repre- 
sentative bodies  for  the  performance  of  functions  so 
essentially  different  and  calling  for  such  different 
capacities  and  acquirements.1 

The  political  activities  of  the  State  give  rise  to 
no  such  complex  problems  as  its  economic  activities. 
Here  the  only  question  that  arises  in  most  cases  is 
whether  a  particular  sphere  of  personal  relationship 
ought  to  be  regulated  or  left  unregulated.  If  it  is 
to  be  regulated  at  all,  it  falls  clearly  according  to 
our  principle  within  the  proper  sphere  of  the  State. 

*  This  point  is  more  fully  developed  in  Chapter  VI.,  where 
it  is  urged  that  if  a  person  is  chosen  to  "represent"  a  body 
of  electors,  he  can  only  be  a  real  representative  if  his  function 
is  clearly  and  specifically  limited  and  defined.  See  also  Intro- 
duction to  Self -Government  in  Industry  (edition  of  1919). 


THE  STATE  101 

For  in  personal  relationship,  whether  regulation  is 
based  on  moral  principles  or  on  principles  of  con- 
venience, the  regulation  clearly  affects,  or  should 
affect,  and  would  but  for  class  and  economic  dis- 
tinctions affect,  every  one  equally  and  in  the  same 
way.  "Political"  activities,  then,  in  the  sense  which 
we  have  given  to  the  phrase,  belong  clearly  to  the 
function  of  the  State. 

What,  then,  of  activities  of  coordination,  such  as 
we  described  earlier  in  this  chapter?  Here  a  far 
greater  difficulty  arises.  To  entrust  the  State  with 
the  function  of  coordination  would  be  to  entrust 
it,  in  many  cases,  with  the  task  of  arbitrating  be- 
tween itself  and  some  other  functional  association, 
say,  a  Church  or  a  Trade  Union.  But  just  as  no 
man  ought  to  be  the  judge  of  his  own  case,  so 
ought  no  association.  Therefore,  coordination  can- 
not belong  to  the  function  of  the  State ;  but  neither 
can  it  belong  to  that  of  any  other  functional  asso- 
ciation. 

We  should  reach  the  same  conclusion  if  we 
ignored  the  argument  against  making  the  State 
judge  in  its  own  cause,  and  attended  only  to  the 
nature  of  coordinating  activities.  For  such  activi- 
ties clearly  bring  in  many  questions  which  do  not 
affect  everybody  equally  and  in  the  same  way,  but 
affect  various  groups  in  essential  different  ways. 
Therefore,  once  more,  we  must  conclude  that  the 
function  of  coordination  does  not  belong  to  the 
State. 

This  is  a  conclusion  of  far-reaching  and  funda- 
mental importance;  for  if  the  State  is  not  the  co- 
ordinating authority  within  the  community,  neither 


102  SOCIAL  THEORY 

is  it,  in  the  sense  usually  attached  to  the  term,  "sov- 
ereign." But  the  claim  to  "Sovereignty"  is  that 
on  which  the  most  exalted  pretensions  of  the  State 
are  based.  Almost  all  modern  theories  of  the  State 
attribute  to  it  not  merely  a  superiority  to  all  other 
forms  of  association,  but  an  absolute  difference  in 
kind,  by  virtue  of  which  it  is  supposed  to  possess, 
in  theory  at  least,  an  unlimited  authority  over  every 
other  association  and  over  every  individual  in  the 
community. 

If  our  account  of  the  nature  of  the  State  is  cor- 
rect, its  functions  must  be  newly  defined  and  lim- 
ited in  terms  of  its  specific  functions,  and  with  this 
definition  and  limitation  its  claim  to  Sovereignty 
falls  utterly  to  the  ground.  We  cannot,  however, 
so  lightly  destroy  an  almost  universally  held  theoreti- 
cal position,  and,  in  order  to  make  perfectly  plain 
our  reasons  for  denying  it,  we  must  at  once  embark 
on  a  discussion  of  the  closely  related  questions  of 
democracy  and  representation.  We  can  then  return 
to  our  study  of  the  State  with  a  better  hope  of 
making  the  argument  perfectly  clear. 


CHAPTER  VI 

DEMOCRACY   AND  REPRESENTATION 

THERE  is  in  our  own  day  an  almost  general 
prejudice  in  favor  of  democracy.  Almost 
everybody  is  a  "democrat,"  and  the  name  of 
democracy  is  invoked  in  support  of  the  most  diverse 
social  systems  and  theories.  This  general  accept- 
ance of  the  name  of  democracy,  even  by  persons 
who  are  obviously  not  in  any  real  sense  "demo- 
crats," is  perhaps  largely  to  be  explained  by  the  fact 
that  the  idea  of  democracy  has  become  almost  in- 
extricably tangled  up  with  the  idea  of  representative 
government,  or  rather  with  a  particular  theory  of 
representative  government  based  on  a  totally  false 
theory  of  representation. 

This  false  theory  is  that  one  man  can  "represent" 
another  or  a  number  of  others,  and  that  his  will  can 
be  treated  as  the  democratic  expression  of  their 
wills.  Stated  in  this  form,  the  theory  admits  of 
only  one  answer.  No  man  can  represent  another 
man,  and  no  man's  will  can  be  treated  as  a  sub- 
stitute for,  or  representative  of,  the  wills  of  others. 
This  may  look,  at  first  sight,  like  a  complete 
denial  of  every  form  of  representative  government, 
and  an  affirmation  of  the  futility  of  all  elections. 

103 


104  SOCIAL  THEORY 

It  is,  however,  nothing  of  the  sort;  it  is  not  an 
attack  upon,  or  an  attempt  to  destroy  the  theoretic 
basis  of,  representative  government,  but  an  attempt 
to  restate  the  theory  of  representation  in  a  truer 
form.  In  order  that  it  may  be  fully  understood, 
we  must  bring  it  into  relation  to  the  doctrine  of 
function  expounded  in  previous  chapters.  We  have 
seen  that,  just  as  every  action  of  an  individual 
aims  at  some  specific  object,  so  men  form  and  enter 
associations  in  pursuit  of  specific  objects  which  can 
be  best  pursued  in  common  by  or  through  an  or- 
ganized group.  Every  association,  then,  has  a  spe- 
cific object  or  objects,  and  it  is  in  pursuit  of  some 
or  all  of  these  objects  that  men  consent  to  be  mem- 
bers of  the  association. 

Every  association  which  sets  before  itself  any 
object  that  is  of  more  than  the  most  rudimentary 
simplicity  finds  itself  compelled  to  assign  tasks  and 
duties,  and  with  these  powers  and  a  share  of  au- 
thority, to  some  of  its  members  in  order  that  the 
common  object  may  be  effectively  pursued.  It  elects, 
perhaps,  a  Secretary,  a  President,  a  Treasurer  and 
an  Executive  Committee,  and  empowers  these  per- 
sons to  act  on  behalf  of  the  association  in  certain 
definite  ways  and  within  certain  limits.  In  the 
smaller  and  more  localized  associations,  much  of  the 
control  of  the  proceedings  of  the  association  may 
remain  in  the  hands  of  the  general  body  of  the  mem- 
bers ;  but  as  soon  as  it  becomes  too  large  or  too  dis- 
persed for  a  general  meeting  to  transact  business, 
or  if  the  members  are  too  preoccupied  with  other 
affairs  to  make  it  their  constant  concern,  the  detailed 
regulation  of  its  proceedings  passes  largely  into  the 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION   105 

hands  of  a  comparatively  small  number  of  its  mem- 
bers, officers,  committee  men,  delegates  or  repre- 
sentatives. In  the  largest  and  most  complex  forms 
of  association,  such  as  the  State,  the  ordinary  mem- 
ber is  reduced  to  a  mere  voter,  and  all  the  direction 
of  actual  affairs  is  done  by  representatives — or  mis- 
representatives. 

At  the  best,  representative  government  gives  rise 
to  many  inconveniences,  to  what  Walt  Whitman 
described  as  "the  never-ending  audacity  of  elected 
persons,"  and  Rousseau  as  "the  tendency  of  all 
government  to  deteriorate."  With  these  inconveni- 
ences we  shall  have  to  deal  at  a  later  stage;  but 
here  we  are  concerned  only  to  make  clear  the  nature 
of  the  representative  relation  as  it  exists  in  such 
associations  as  we  have  spoken  of  above. 

In  the  majority  of  associations,  the  nature  of  the 
relation  is  clear  enough.  The  elected  person — of- 
ficial, committee  man,  or  delegate — makes  no  pre- 
tension of  substituting  his  personality  for  those  of 
his  constituents,  or  of  representing  them  except  in 
relation  to  a  quite  narrow  and  clearly  defined  pur- 
pose or  group  of  purposes  which  the  association  ex- 
ists to  fulfill.  There  is,  then,  in  these  cases,  no  ques- 
tion of  one  man  taking  the  place  of  many ;  for  what 
the  representative  professes  to  represent  is  not  the 
whole  will  and  personalities  of  his  constituents,  but 
merely  so  much  of  them  as  they  have  put  into  the 
association,  and  as  is  concerned  with  the  purposes 
which  the  association  exists  to  fulfill. 

This  is  the  character  of  all  true  representation. 
It  is  impossible  to  represent  human  beings  as  selves 
or  centers  of  consciousness;  it  is  quite  possible  to 


106  SOCIAL  THEORY 

represent,  though  with  an  inevitable  element  of  dis- 
tortion which  must  always  be  recognized,  so  much 
of  human  beings  as  they  themselves  put  into  asso- 
ciated effort  for  a  specific  purpose. 

True  representation,  therefore,  like  true  associa- 
tion, is  always  specific  and  functional,  and  never 
general  and  inclusive.  What  is  represented  is  never 
man,  the  individual,  but  always  certain  purposes 
common  to  groups  of  individuals.  That  theory  of 
representative  government  which  is  based  upon  the 
idea  that  individuals  can  be  represented  as  wholes 
is  a  false  theory,  and  destruction  of  personal  rights 
and  social  well-being. 

The  fact  that  a  man  cannot  be  represented  as  a 
man  seems  so  obvious  that  it  is  difficult  to  under- 
stand how  many  theories  of  government  and  democ- 
racy have  come  to  be  built  upon  it.  Each  man  is 
a  center  of  consciousness  and  reason,  a  will  pos- 
sessed of  the  power  of  self-determination,  an  ulti- 
mate reality.  How  can  one  such  will  be  made  to 
stand  in  place  of  many?  How  can  one  man,  being 
himself,  be  at  the  same  time  a  number  of  other 
people?  It  would  be  a  miracle  if  he  could;  but  it  is 
a  risky  experiment  to  base  our  social  system  upon 
a  hypothetical  miracle. 

Functional  representation  is  open  to  no  such  ob- 
jection. It  does  not  lay  claim  to  any  miraculous 
quality :  it  does  not  profess  to  be  able  to  substitute 
the  will  of  one  man  for  the  wills  of  many.  Its 
adherents  recognize  the  element  of  distortion  which 
exists  in  all  representation;  but  to  them  this  dis- 
tortion is  not  a  problem,  but  an  inevitable  fact.  It 
does  not  annihilate  or  detract  from  the  will  of  any 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION  107 

individual ;  it  merely  provides  a  basis  whereby,  when 
the  individual  has  made  up  his  mind  that  a  certain 
object  is  desirable,  he  can  cooperate  with  his  fellows 
in  taking  the  course  of  action  necessary  for  its  at- 
tainment. 

Of  course,  I  do  not  intend  to  convey  the  idea  that 
there  are  just  so  many  functions  in  Society,  and  that 
to  each  corresponds  exactly  its  own  functional  as- 
sociation and  form  of  representation.  The  need  of 
Society  for  functional  association  and  representa- 
tion expands  and  develops  as  Society  becomes 
larger  and  more  complex.  A  special  form  of  asso- 
ciation and  representation,  at  one  time  unnecessary, 
may  become  necessary  as  the  work  of  Society  in- 
creases in  a  particular  direction.  Moreover,  in  a 
very  small  Society,  such  as  the  ancient  City-State, 
where  the  direct  participation  of  the  mass  of  the 
people  in  government  was  possible,  functional  asso- 
ciation was  only  needed  in  a  very  limited  degree, 
and  it  was  often  possible  for  the  people  to  choose 
directly  their  functional  representatives  without  any 
intervening  stage  of  functional  association.  The 
principle  of  representation,  however,  is  the  same; 
the  representative  represents  not  persons,  but  defi- 
nite and  particular  purposes  common  to  a  number 
of  persons. 

Having  made  plain  our  conception  of  the  true  na- 
ture of  representation,  we  can  now  look  more  closely 
at  its  consequences.  In  proportion  as  the  pur- 
poses for  which  the  representative  is  chosen  lose 
clarity  and  definiteness,  representation  passes  into 
misrepresentation,  and  the  representative  character 
of  the  acts  resulting  from  association  disappears. 


108  SOCIAL  THEORY 

Thus,  misrepresentation  is  seen  at  its  worst  to-day 
in  that  professedly  omnicompetent  "representative" 
body — Parliament — and  in  the  Cabinet  which  is  sup- 
posed to  depend  upon  it.  Parliament  professes  to 
represent  all  the  citizens  in  all  things,  and  therefore 
as  a  rule  represents  none  of  them  in  anything.  It 
is  chosen  to  deal  with  anything  that  may  turn  up, 
quite  irrespective  of  the  fact  that  the  different  things 
that  do  turn  up  require  different  types  of  persons 
to  deal  with  them.  It  is  therefore  peculiarly  subject 
to  corrupt,  and  especially  to  plutocratic,  influences, 
and  does  everything  badly,  because  it  is  not  chosen 
to  do  any  definite  thing  well.  This  is  not  the  fault 
of  the  actual  Members  of  Parliament;  they  muddle 
because  they  are  set  the  impossible  task  of  being 
good  at  everything,  and  representing  everybody  in 
relation  to  every  purpose. 

There  can  be  only  one  escape  from  the  futility  of 
our  present  methods  of  parliamentary  government; 
and  that  is  to  find  an  association  and  method  of 
representation  for  each  function,  and  a  function 
for  each  association  and  body  of  representatives. 
In  other  words,  real  democracy  is  to  be  found,  not  in 
a  single  omnicompetent  representative  assembly, 
but  in  a  system  of  coordinated  functional  represen- 
tative bodies. 

There  is  another,  and  a  simpler,  line  of  argument 
which  leads  straight  to  the  same  conclusion  as  we 
have  already  reached.  It  is  obvious  that  different 
people  are  interested  in,  and  good  at  doing,  different 
things.  It  is  therefore  equally  obvious  that,  if  I  am 
a  sensible  person,  I  shall  desire  to  choose  different 
people  to  represent  my  wishes  in  relation  to  different 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION  109 

things.  To  ask  me  to  choose  one  man  to  represent 
me  in  relation  to  everything  is  to  insult  my  intelli- 
gence, and  to  offer  me  every  inducement  to  choose 
some  one  so  colorless  that  he  is  unlikely  to  do  any- 
thing at  all — because  he  will  at  least  probably  do 
no  great  harm,  and  no  great  notice  will  be  taken  of 
him.  This  is  how  parliamentary  elections  usually 
work  out  at  the  present  time. 

But,  if  I  am  asked  to  choose  a  different  person  to 
represent  my  wishes  in  relation  to  each  of  the  main 
groups  of  social  purposes  of  which  I  am  conscious, 
I  shall  do  my  best  to  choose  in  each  case  the  man 
who  is  most  fitted  to  represent  my  views  and  to  carry 
them  into  effect.  In  short,  the  one  method  will  in- 
evitably result  in  government  by  the  incompetent; 
the  other  will  at  least  give  every  chance  for  compe- 
tent representatives  to  be  chosen. 

Democracy,  then,  must  be  conceived  in  the  first 
place  as  a  coordinated  system  of  functional  repre- 
sentation. But,  as  soon  as  we  introduce  the  word 
"democracy,"  we  raise  a  further  question,  that  of 
the  relation  between  me  and  my  functional  repre- 
sentative after  I  have  chosen  him.  In  fact,  we  find 
ourselves  in  the  thick  of  the  old  controversy  of 
"representative  versus  delegate." 

Does  our  revised  theory  of  representation  throw 
any  light  upon  this  controversy?  Or,  in  other 
words,  is  the  question  whether  the  elected  person, 
once  he  has  been  elected,  should  follow  his  own  will 
or  should  be  instructed  as  far  as  possible  on  every 
issue  by  those  who  have  chosen  him,  to  be  an- 
swered in  a  different  way  when  the  theory  of  repre- 
sentation is  different?  I  think  the  theory  of  repre- 


110  SOCIAL  THEORY 

sentation  which  we  adopt  must  make  a  considerable 
difference  to  our  view  of  the  relation  of  the  elected 
person  to  his  constituents. 

In  the  first  place,  attempts  to  make  the  elected 
person  a  mere  delegate  must  always  break  down, 
whatever  the  form  of  representation.  There  are 
many  issues  on  which  it  is  not  merely  undesirable, 
but  impossible,  to  tie  down  a  delegate  by  instruc- 
tions, because  unforeseen  situations  and  complica- 
tions constantly  arise.  If  for  no  other  reason,  pure 
delegation  must  break  down  because  the  delegate  is 
so  often  waiting  for  further  instructions  that 
nothing  gets  done,  and  the  best  opportunities  for 
action  are  continually  being  missed.  On  the  other 
hand,  pure  "representation"  without  instructions 
or  counsel  from  the  electors  approaches  very  nearly 
to  false  representation,  substituting,  even  within  a 
restricted  sphere,  the  will  of  one  for  the  wills  of 
many. 

Our  functional  democracy,  based  on  functional 
associations  and  representations,  provides  a  way  out 
of  this  difficulty.  It  enables  us  to  combine  repre- 
sentation with  constant  counsel  from  the  con- 
stituents, and  thus  makes  it  possible  to  abandon 
the  theory  of  delegation  without  imperiling 
democratic  control.  The  chief  difficulty  of  demo- 
cratic control  over  the  representative  in  the  political 
sphere  to-day  is  that,  as  soon  as  the  voters  have 
exercised  their  votes,  their  existence  as  a  group 
lapses  until  the  time  when  a  new  election  is  re- 
quired. No  body  or  group  remains  in  being  to 
direct  upon  the  elected  person  a  constant  stream  of 
counsel  and  criticism.  Consequently,  the  elected 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION   111 

person  must  receive  full  instructions  at  the  time 
of  election,  which  produces  an  intolerable  situation 
as  soon  as  there  is  any  change  in  the  circumstances, 
or  else  he  must  become  a  pure  representa- 
tive, acting  on  his  own  responsibility  and  conse- 
quently expressing  only  his  own  will  and  not  those 
of  his  constituents.  This  dilemma  exists  wherever 
the  body  of  electors  does  not  remain  in  being  and 
activity  as  a  body  throughout  the  tenure  of  office  of 
the  elected  person. 

Functional  democracy,  in  which  representatives 
emanate  from  functional  associations  which  have  a 
permanent  being,  meets  this  difficulty.  It  is  no 
longer  necessary  for  the  group  to  instruct  its  repre- 
sentative, because  it  can  continue  throughout  his 
time  of  office  to  criticise  and  advise  him,  and  be- 
cause, I  would  add,  it  can  at  any  time  recall  him  if  it 
is  not  satisfied  with  the  way  in  which  he  is  doing 
his  job.  Recall  is,  in  fact,  the  final  safeguard,  while 
criticism  and  advice  are  the  normal  means  of  keep- 
ing the  representation  democratic. 

In  our  own  day,  experience  of  bad  leaders,  both  in 
the  State  and  in  other  forms  of  association,  has  bred 
an  almost  general  distrust  of  leadership,  and  a 
strong  desire,  especially  on  the  so-called  "left  wing," 
to  do  away  with  leaders,  and  substitute  direct  control 
by  the  "rank  and  file"  through  delegates  duly  in- 
structed how  to  act  and  vote.  But  there  is  no 
reason  to  take  the  badness  of  present-day  leaders 
as  a  sign  that  the  whole  idea  of  leadership  should  be 
given  up.  Certainly,  before  we  adopt  any  such 
drastic  expedient,  all  the  circumstances  ought  to 
be  fully  explored.  But,  at  the  very  beginning  of 


SOCIAL  THEORY 

this  explanation,  the  biggest  single  cause  of  the 
collapse  of  leadership  is  plainly  to  be  seen.  The 
absence  of  any  true  principle  of  representation  in 
the  sphere  of  the  State,  the  failure  that  is  to  "func- 
tionalize"  the  State,  and  to  make  the  political  rep- 
resentative a  functional  representative,  is  the 
main  cause  of  the  perversion  of  political  leadership. 
But  the  perversion  of  political  leadership  is,  in  its 
turn,  the  main  cause  of  the  perversion  of  leadership 
elsewhere.  The  Trade  Union  leader,  and  many 
other  "functional"  leaders,  have  their  eyes  fixed 
upon  Parliament,  and  the  thought  of  Parliament 
distracts  them  from  their  proper  work.  Moreover, 
this  parliamentary  arriere-pensee  is  an  important 
factor  in  causing  the  wrong  leaders  to  be  selected, 
and  the  wrong  candidates  to  offer  themselves  for 
selection. 

We  must  preserve  leadership  without  sacrificing 
democratic  control.  Leadership  is  as  vital  to  a 
democracy  as  to  an  aristocracy  or  a  monarchy. 
And  it  is  as  true  in  a  democracy  as  anywhere  else 
that  the  good  leader  must  be  given  a  great  deal  of 
rope. 

In  a  functional  democracy,  where  the  elected 
person  is  a  representative  and  not  a  delegate,  and 
where  he  acts  not  as  a  rule  upon  instructions,  but 
upon  criticism  and  advice,  I  believe  that  the  good 
leader  will  find  ample  scope,  as  soon  as  the  distrust 
which  is  born  of  false  democracy  has  had  time  to 
wear  off.  It  is  true  that  he  will  be  liable  to  sum- 
mary recall ;  but  who  believes  that,  after  the  initial 
mistakes,  this  power  would  be  too  freely  exercised  ? 
The  risks  are  all  the  other  way :  it  is  of  a  too  long 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION  113 

tenure  of  office  by  second-rate  men  that  we  should  be 
afraid.  Functional  democracy  will  give  the  good 
leader  his  first  real  chance  of  leading  by  his  merits, 
with  an  instructed  and  active  body  of  constituents 
behind  him.  For  it  must  be  remembered  that  not 
only  will  the  representative  be  chosen  to  do  a  job 
about  which  he  knows  something,  but  he  will  be 
chosen  by  persons  who  know  something  of  it  too. 
Truly  a  revolutionary  proposal  for  a  democrat  to 
make! 

But  some  one  will  object,  if  I  have  this  respect  for 
leaders  why  do  I  insist  on  the  right  of  recall?  I  do 
so,  because  I  have  even  more  respect  for  human 
wills  and  personalities,  and  because  I  feel  that 
democracy  implies  far  more  than  the  passive  consent 
of  the  mass  of  the  people  in  government.  Democ- 
racy implies  active,  and  not  merely  passive, 
citizenship,  and  implies  for  everybody  at  least  the 
opportunity  to  be  an  active  citizen,  not  only  of  the 
State,  but  of  every  association  with  which  his 
personality  or  circumstances  cause  him  to  be 
concerned. 

Those  who  profess  to  find  the  bond  of  Society  in 
the  passive  consent  of  the  mass  of  the  people  fall 
between  two  stools.  If  the  mass  of  the  people  are 
necessary  to  the  justification  of  the  social  order,  they 
are  necessary  in  the  active  and  not  in  the  passive 
mood.  In  other  words,  if  we  base  our  social  theory 
upon  the  attitude  of  the  mass  of  the  people,  we  are 
logically  driven  to  insist  that  this  attitude  ought  to 
be  as  explicit  and  positive  as  possible. 

A  well-organized  Society  is  one  in  which  not 
merely  is  the  administration  good,  but  the  wills  of 


114  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  members  of  the  community  are  active,  and  find 
expression  through  the  various  associations  and 
institutions  of  which  Society  is  made  up.  It  should 
be  the  aim  of  those  who  strive  to  direct  the  course 
of  social  organization  to  promote  the  fullest  partici- 
pation of  everybody  in  the  work  of  government. 
This  alone  is  true  democracy,  and  this  can  only  be 
secured  by  the  fullest  development  of  functional 
organization.  The  current  theory  of  representative 
government  is  a  denial  of  this  principle ;  for,  having 
chosen  his  representative,  the  ordinary  man  has, 
according  to  that  theory,  nothing  left  to  do  except 
to  let  other  people  govern  him.  Functional  organiza- 
tion and  representation,  on  the  other  hand,  imply 
the  constant  participation  of  the  ordinary  man  in 
the  conduct  of  those  parts  of  the  structure  of  Society 
with  which  he  is  directly  concerned,  and  which  he 
has  therefore  the  best  chance  of  understanding.  A 
man  may  be  pardoned  for  not  quite  knowing  for 
whom  to  vote  in  a  parliamentary  election,  or  how  to 
appraise  the  career  of  his  Member  of  Parliament, 
because  the  Member  of  Parliament  of  to-day  is 
elected  not  for  any  clearly  defined  purpose,  but  in 
the  void,  to  deal  with  anything  that  may  chance  to 
turn  up.  A  functional  association,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  concerned  with  doing  a  definite  job,  and  its 
officers  are  also  concerned  with  getting  that  definite 
job  done.  The  member  is  connected  with  the 
association  because  its  business  is  his  business,  and 
he  is  therefore  able  far  more  intelligently  to  initiate 
and  criticise  action  in  relation  to  it  than  in  relation 
to  an  omnium  gatherum  miscalled  "politics." 
Functional  organization  gives  every  one  the  chance 


DEMOCRACY  AND  REPRESENTATION   115 

of  being,  in  the  measure  of  his  competence  and  in- 
terest, an  active  citizen. 

This  does  not  mean  that,  in  a  functional  democ- 
racy, each  person  will  count  for  one  and  no  person 
for  more  than  one.  That  is  the  cant  of  false  democ- 
racy. The  essence  of  functional  democracy  is  that 
a  man  should  count  as  many  times  over  as  there  are 
functions  in  which  he  is  interested.  To  count  once 
is  to  count  about  nothing  in  particular:  what  men 
want  is  to  count  on  the  particular  issues  in  which 
they  are  interested.  Instead  of  "One  man,  one 
vote,"  we  must  say,  "One  man  as  many  votes  as 
interests,  but  only  one  vote  in  relation  to  each  in- 
terest." 

This  restatement  of  a  democratic  principle  still 
leaves  intact  the  equal  voting  power  of  unequal 
persons  voting  on  a  particular  issue.  That,  too,  is 
democracy,  not  because  equalization  of  votes  can 
make  unequal  persons  equal,  but  because  the  right 
way  for  the  better  man  to  "pull  his  weight"  is  not 
by  casting  more  votes  himself,  but  by  influencing 
others  to  vote  aright.  Democracy  involves  leader- 
ship by  influence. 

Before  we  end  this  chapter,  we  must  face  a  very 
foolish,  but  very  often  urged,  objection  to  the  whole 
idea  of  functional  representation.  Functional  rep- 
resentation, we  are  told,  is  impossible  because, 
in  order  to  make  it  work,  everybody  will  have 
to  vote  so  many  times  over.  I  fail  to  see 
where  the  objection  arises.  If  a  man  is  not  in- 
terested enough  to  vote,  and  cannot  be  roused  to 
interest  enough  to  make  him  vote,  on,  say,  a 
dozen  distinct  subjects,  he  waives  his  right  to  vote, 


116  SOCIAL  THEORY      , 

and  the  result  is  no  less  democratic  than  if  he  voted 
blindly  and  without  interest.  It  is  true  that  the 
result  is  not  so  democratic  as  it  would  be  if  every- 
body voted  with  interest  and  knowledge,  but  it  is  far 
more  democratic  than  it  would  be  if  everybody  voted 
without  interest  or  knowledge,. as  they  tend  to  do  in 
parliamentary  elections.  Many  and  keen  voters  are 
best  of  all;  but  few  and  keen  voters  are  next  best. 
A  vast  and  uninstructed  electorate  voting  on  a 
general  and  undefined  issue  is  the  worst  of  all.  Yet 
that  is  what  we  call  democracy  to-day. 


CHAPTER  VII 

GOVERNMENT    AND    LEGISLATION 

WE  have  seen  that,  as  soon  as  any  associa- 
tion passes  beyond  the  doing  of  the  most 
simple  and  elementary  acts,  it  becomes  neces- 
sary for  it  to  have  representatives — persons  en- 
dowed with  the  right,  within  certain  limits,  to 
speak  and  act  in  the  name  of  the  association,  to 
deliberate  on  its  behalf,  and  to  take  the  steps 
necessary  for  carrying  out  its  decisions.  The  char- 
acter and  complexity  of  the  representative  methods 
adopted  vary  both  with  the  size  and  geographical 
dispersion  of  the  association,  and  with  the  com- 
plexity of  the  functions  which  it  exists  to  perform. 
Thus,  as  long  as  it  is  possible  for  all  the  members 
to  meet  together  and  discuss  each  issue  of  policy 
as  it  arises,  representatives,  where  they  are  required, 
will  be  unlikely  to  acquire  any  very  great  power, 
and  will  be  mainly  engaged  in  doing  the  routine 
work  necessary  to  carry  out  the  decisions  of  the 
general  meeting.  This  is  the  position  to-day  in 
those  parishes  which  are  governed  by  a  Parish  Meet- 
ing, or  in  a  small  local  Trade  Union  or  other  asso- 
ciation. 

At  this  stage,  it  will  be  seen,  there  may  be  rudi- 
117 


118  SOCIAL  THEORY 

mentary  officials,  permanent  or  occasional,  corre- 
sponding to  the  fully  developed  executive  officers 
of  more  advanced  forms  of  association,  there  may 
be  a  committee,  permanent  or  occasional,  and  also 
of  an  executive  character.  But  there  is  as  yet  no 
representative  legislative  assembly,  no  body  of 
men  selected  from  the  association,  and  legislating 
or  laying  down  the  main  lines  of  policy  in  the  name 
of  all  the  members.  This  is  a  further  development, 
which  arises  when  it  becomes  impossible  or  incon- 
venient for  all  the  members  to  meet  and  deliberate 
together.  It  is  at  this  stage  that  the  real  problem 
of  government  arises,  and  the  association  creates 
for  itself  a  representative  assembly,  entrusted  with 
the  task  of  legislation. 

This  does  not  mean  that  the  final  decision  on 
questions  of  policy  passes  altogether  and  neces- 
sarily away  from  the  whole  body  of  the  members. 
There  remain  two  ways  in  which  the  whole  of  the 
members  may  still  keep  important  decisions  in  their 
own  hands.  They  may  choose  to  act  through  dele- 
gates rather  than  representatives,  and  although 
they  cannot  all  meet  together,  the  local  members 
may  hold  meetings  in  a  number  of  centers  to  in- 
struct their  delegate,  or,  in  the  alternative,  to  advise 
their  representative,  how  to  vote.  Or  they  may 
adopt  the  institution  of  the  referendum,  and  insist 
that  important  issues  shall  be  submitted  to  a  ballot 
vote  of  all  the  members. 

Both  these  expedients,  however,  are  extremely 
clumsy,  when  it  is  attempted  to  apply  them  to  any 
but  the  broadest  and  simplest  issues.  For,  in  either 
case,  every  question  has  to  be  reduced  to  a  simple 


GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION   119 

Aye  or  No,  and  the  possibility  of  adjustments, 
amendments  and  new  situations  has  to  be  left  out 
of  account.  The  method  of  referendum  or  instruc- 
tion is,  I  believe,  the  right  method  where  the  broad- 
est and  simplest  issues  are  concerned;  but  it  offers 
no  help  in  dealing  with  the  more  complex  and  de- 
tailed issues  which  are  constantly  arising  in  almost 
every  association. 

Men  are  driven,  therefore,  to  the  expedient  of 
the  representative  *  legislative  assembly  for  getting 
the  ordinary  day-to-day  work  of  the  more  complex 
associations  efficiently  accomplished.  In  the  less 
complex  associations,  very  often  no  separate 
legislative  assembly  is  created,  but  the  Executive 
Committee  acts  also  as  a  legislature  within  the  limits 
which  the  purposes  of  the  assembly  require.  The 
more  complex  type  of  association,  however,  usually 
creates  a  separate  body  for  the  task  of  legislation, 
and  calls  this  body  together  as  required,  the  Execu- 
tive Committee  remaining  in  being  to  carry  out  its 
decisions.  In  the  most  complex  types  of  associa- 
tion, such  as  the  State,  the  legislative  assembly, 
as  well  as  the  Executive  Committee,  tends  to 
become  permanent  and  to  remain  in  almost  con- 
tinuous session.  Even  Parliament,  however,  has 
only  very  gradually  developed  this  permanent  and 
continuous  character.  The  early  Parliaments  were 
occasional  bodies. 

The  purpose  of  this  chapter  is  to  investigate  more 

1  It  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind,  throughout  this  chapter, 

the  sense  attached  to  the  word  "representation."    It  is  always 

functional  representation  alone  that  is  to  be  regarded  as  true 

representation. 


120  SOCIAL  THEORY 

closely  than  we  have  yet  done  the  actual  ways  of 
operation  of  representative  bodies  and  persons,  in 
order  to  see  how  the  will  of  the  members  finds 
expression  through  their  representatives,  and  also 
how  it  is  sometimes  perverted  and  twisted  in  passing 
through  the  representatives'  intermediary.  One 
of  the  most  illuminating  chapters  of  Rousseau's 
Social  Contract 1  deal  with  the  "tendency  of  govern- 
ment to  deteriorate."  All  action  through  repre- 
sentatives, he  explains,  involves  to  a  certain  extent 
the  substitution  of  the  wills  of  the  representatives 
for  those  of  the  represented.  Moreover,  all  groups 
of  men,  by  experience  of  acting  together,  tend 
to  develop  in  some  degree  a  "common  will"  of  their 
own.  Chosen  to  express  the  "common  will"  of 
those  whom  they  represent,  they  acquire  a  "com- 
mon will"  of  their  own  different  from  that  of  the 
represented. 

We  have  given  in  the  last  chapter  our  reasons  for 
supposing  that  the  definite  limits  and  purposes 
of  functional  representatives  make  these  dangers 
far  less  applicable  to  it  than  to  so-called  "repre- 
sentation" which  is  general  and  not  functional. 
This,  however,  does  not  mean  that,  even  with  func- 
tional representation,  the  danger  altogether  dis- 
appears. It  is,  indeed,  impossible  that  it  should 
ever  disappear,  unless  as  the  result  of  a  miracle 
which  would  be  also  an  overwhelming  calamity. 
For  the  possibility  of  Society  is  based  on  the  fact 
that,  By  acting  together,  men  do  as  a  rule  develop 
an  increasing  sense  of  community.  This  is  the  very 
basis  of  Society;  but  it  has  inevitably  its  bad,  as 
1  Social  Contract,  bk.  Hi.,  chap.  x. 


GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION   121 

well  as  its  good,  side.  For  it  means  that  there  is 
a  sense  of  community  among  thieves  as  well  as 
among  honest  men,  and  among  members  of  com- 
mittees and  representative  assemblies  as  well  as 
among  members  of  groups  and  associations.  It 
means  that,  however  faithfully  the  members  of  a 
committee  may  try  to  fulfill  their  whole  duty  to  their 
members,  an  element  of  committee  loyalty  will 
almost  inevitably  enter  into  their  actions.  They  will 
tend  to  back  one  another,  whether  they  are  right 
or  wrong,  and,  when  one  of  them  is  in  danger  of 
not  being  reflected,  the  rest  will  often  tend  to 
support  him  even  if  they  are  aware  that  he  is 
not  the  best  man  for  the  job.  They  will  say  one 
to  another:  "After  all,  we  can't  let  down  old 
Jones." 

It  is  an  easy  and  a  highly  popular  pastime  to  gird 
at  this  idiosyncrasy  of  elected  persons.  But  it  is 
useless  to  abuse  men  for  being  clannish;  we  must 
rather  recognize  that  the  tendency  to  clannishness 
is  the  cement  of  the  social  system,  and  make  up 
our  minds  to  adopt  the  proper  treatment  in  dealing 
with  it.  In  the  first  place,  we  must  always  try  to 
make  the  position  of  the  representative  as  clear 
and  definite  as  possible,  clearly  marking  out  his 
powers  and  functions  and  sphere  of  action  and  re- 
sponsibility. And  secondly,  we  must  always  try 
to  provide  as  a  background  for  the  action  of  the 
representative,  an  active  and  continuously  resource- 
ful organized  body  of  constituents.  It  is,  I  believe, 
the  presence  of  this  continuously  active  constituency 
that  gives  to  the  Soviet  system,  despite  its  counter- 
vailing disadvantages,  its  peculiar  vitality.  In  short 


SOCIAL  THEORY 

it  is  for  the  body  of  the  members  to  counteract 
the  tendency  to  clannishness  and  even  conspiracy 
on  the  part  of  the  elected  persons  by  being  clannish 
and  alert  in  pressing  forward  their  own  common 
wills. 

I  have  so  far  spoken  of  the  tendency  of  bodies  of 
elected  persons  to  substitute  their  own  wills  for  the 
wills  which  they  are  supposed  to  represent  as  if 
it  were  a  single  and  indivisible  phenomenon.  There 
is,  however,  an  important  distinction  not  so  much 
in  kind  as  in  degree.  There  is  the  involuntary  and 
often  quite  unconscious  perversion  or  substitution 
which  arises  directly  out  of  the  fact  that  the  mem- 
bers of  the  representative  body  are  constantly 
acting  and  deliberating  together;  and  there  is  also 
the  conscious  and  voluntary  perversion  which 
may  easily  develop  out  of  the  unconscious  perversion 
unless  it  is  strongly  checked  by  the  presence  of  an 
active  electorate.  Cabinet  Government  is  probably 
the  worst  instance  of  such  deliberate  and  conscious 
perversion,  of  which  the  Party  System  is  also  an 
awful,  but  illuminating,  example.1  Any  long  con- 
tinuance of  this,  aggravated  form  of  perversion 
proves  that  there  is  something  'seriously  wrong 
either  with  the  electorate  as  a  whole  or  with  the 
form  of  representation.  Its  constant  presence  in  the 
political  system  of  almost  every  country  shows  either 
that  the  peoples  of  the  world  are  fundamentally  cor- 
rupt or  foolish,  or  that  the  generally  accepted  theory 
of  representative  government  is  radically  wrong. 

1  See  The  Party  System,  by  Hilaire  Belloc  and  Cecil  Chester- 
ton, and  Democracy  and  the  Organization  of  Political  Parties, 
by  Robert  Michels. 


GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION 

Perversion,  by  the  substitution  of  the  will  of  the 
elected  person  for  the  wills  he  has  been  chosen  to 
represent,  is  liable  to  occur  in  all  types  of  repre- 
sentative body,  and  in  all  representative  officials. 
We  have  therefore  been  able  so  far  to  treat  repre- 
sentative institutions  together  without  distinguish- 
ing for  the  most  part  between  the  various  types.  The 
next  stage  in  our  argument  requires  a  more  careful 
and  detailed  examination  of  the  types  of  repre- 
sentative institutions  with  a  view  to  ascertaining 
their  right  relationship  one  to  another  and  to  the 
represented.  This  brings  us  at  once  to  a  further 
discussion  of  the  relation  between  legislative  and 
executive  power. 

Many  of  the  older  writers  on  social  science  based 
the  greater  part  of  their  exposition  of  the  forms  of 
social  organization  upon  the  double  distinction  of 
legislative  and  executive  power,  or  upon  the  triple 
distinction  of  legislature,  executive  and  judiciary. 
I  have  endeavored  elsewhere  to  show  that  the  dis- 
tinction between  legislature  and  executive  provides 
no  adequate  basis  for  classifying  the  activities  of 
modern  Societies.1  It  may  be  possible  to  distin- 
guish with  clearness  sufficient  for  all  practical  pur- 
poses between  the  work  of  law-making  and  the  work 
of  seeing  to  the  execution  of  the  laws  (leaving  aside 
for  the  moment  the  judicial  aspect)  as  long  as  the 
social  situations  to  be  dealt  with  remain  essentially 
simple  and  free  from  technical  complications.  But 
in  the  communities  of  to-day  law-making  and  law- 

1  See  Self-Government  in  Industry,  chapter  entitled  "The 
Nature  of  the  State."  The  final  section  of  the  same  chapter 
deals  with  the  judiciary. 


SOCIAL  THEORY 

administering  inevitably  run  together.  It  is  im- 
possible to  draft  a  law  which  will  meet  all  the 
complexities  of  the  case,  and  consequently  our  Parlia- 
ments and  other  legislative  bodies  are  continually 
passing  laws,  many  of  whose  clauses  virtually  dele- 
gate the  power  of  legislation  to  the  administrators, 
by  providing  that  such  and  such  matters  may  be 
dealt  with  by  Order  in  Council  or  special  order,  or 
that  the  Minister  concerned  may  make  Orders  and 
Regulations  dealing  with  such  and  such  a  matter — 
provisions  which  effectively  blur  the  already  faint 
line  of  division  between  legislation  and  administra- 
tion. In  some  cases,  the  legislative  body  attempts  to 
retaliate  and  to  establish  a  control  over  administra- 
tion through  parliamentary  questions,  interpella- 
tions, adjournment  motions,  votes  to  reduce  a  salary 
or  a  credit,  Standing  Committees,  Select  Commit- 
tees and  what  not.  The  honors,  however,  under  the 
parliamentary  system,  rest  as  a  rule  with  the 
Executive,  which  steadily  and  successfully  en- 
croaches upon  the  sphere  of  legislation. 

Nor  are  these  phenomena  confined  to  Cabinets 
and  political  assemblies.  They  appear  also  in  other 
forms  of  association.  Trade  Union  Executives  try 
to  seize  the  power  of  legislation  out  of  the  hands  of 
Delegate  Meetings ;  and  Delegate  Meetings  retaliate 
by  encroaching  upon  the  sphere  of  administration. 
Wherever  much  detailed  and  complicated  business 
has  to  be  transacted,  the  line  of  demarcation  between 
legislature  and  executive  tends  to  break  down. 

This  breakdown  has  the  more  far-reaching  con- 
sequences for  social  theory.  Great  stress  used  to 
be  laid  on  the  balance  of  powers  between  legis- 


GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION    125 

lature  and  executive  as  a  safeguard  against  tyranny 
and  perversion.  Whatever  value  this  principle  may 
have  had  in  the  past,  it  has  little  or  none  to-day, 
except  as  a  minor  safeguard  within  each  particular 
association.  Those  who  seek  a  balance  of  power  in 
social  organization  are  therefore  compelled  to  seek 
for  a  new  principle  of  division.  The  old  theory  was 
an  attempt  to  divide  by  stages — the  law  was  first 
enacted  by  the  legislature — and  it  then  passed  on 
to  the  succeeding  stage  of  being  administered  by 
the  executive.  If  this  method  of  division  by  stages 
has  broken  down,  there  seems  to  be  only  one  alter- 
native open,  if  we  desire  to  adhere  to  the  principle 
of  balance  in  any  form.  That  alternative  is  to  divide 
by  function. 

In  earlier  chapters  of  this  book  I  have  tried  to 
establish  the  preeminence  of  function  as  the  primary 
principle  of  social  organization.  We  have  now  to 
see  what  are  the  consequences  of  the  acceptance  of 
this  principle  in  the  sphere  of  government.  Instead 
of  a  division  based  on  the  stage  which  an  associa- 
tive act  has  reached  (the  stage  of  law-making  or  the 
stage  of  administration),  it  gives  us  a  new  principle 
of  division  according,  not  to  the  stage,  but  to  the 
content  and  purpose  of  the  act.  In  other  words,  the 
principle  of  function  implies  that  each  functional 
form  of  association  has  and  is  its  own  legislature 
and  its  own  executive. 

This  may  seem  either  a  very  startling  or  a  very 
commonplace  proposition  according  to  the  manner 
in  which  it  is  interpreted.  It  is  commnoplace,  if  it 
only  means  that  each  association  has  to  frame  rules 
or  laws  for  its  own  guidance,  and  to  administer  the 


126  SOCIAL  THEORY 

rules  or  laws  which  it  has  made.  It  is  startling,  if 
it  means  that  the  laws  of  other  functional  associa- 
tions have  the  same  binding  character  and  social 
status  as  the  laws  of  the  State. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  the  startling  form  of  the  prop- 
osition which  more  nearly  expresses  what  I  mean. 
It  flows  as  a  necessary  consequence  from  the  denial 
of  State  Sovereignty  and  omnicompetence,  and  the 
affirmation  of  the  functional  character  proper  to  the 
State,  as  to  other  associations,  that  the  State's  ex- 
clusive claim  to  the  right  of  legislation  goes  by 
the  board.  It  retains,  of  course,  its  right  to  legislate 
within  its  function;  but  this  right  belongs  also  to 
other  associations  in  relation  to  their  numbers  and 
within  their  respective  functions. 

This  does  not  mean  that  all  forms  of  functional 
legislation  are  equally  important,  any  more  than  all 
forms  of  association  are  equally  important.  But  it 
does  mean  that,  in  the  measure  of  their  importance, 
all  forms  of  association  acquire  for  their  legislative 
acts  a  comparable  social  status. 

The  full  implications  of  this  functional  division 
of  legislation  can  only  be  made  apparent  at  the  end 
of  the  four  following  chapters.  I  must,  however, 
at  once  try  to  meet,  at  least,  provisionally,  an  ob- 
jection which  is  almost  certainly  present  already 
in  the  reader's  mind.  If  the  power  of  legislation  is 
divided,  he  will  ask,  does  not  this  also  imply  the 
division  of  coercive  power?  Or,  in  other  words,  if 
the  State's  exclusive  right  to  legislate  is  challenged, 
must  not  the  State's  exclusive  right  to  use  coercion 
be  challenged  also? 

I  answer  unhesitatingly  that  it  must,  and  that 


GOVERNMENT  AND  LEGISLATION    127 

the  State's  monopoly  of  coercive  power  disappears 
with  its  loss  of  Sovereignty  and  of  the  monopoly  of 
legislation.  But,  before  we  deal  finally  with  the 
huge  problem  which  is  here  raised,  we  must  make 
quite  certain  that  we  know  what  we  mean  by 
coercion,  and  distinguish  between  various  forms  and 
uses  of  coercive  power. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

COERCION  AND  COORDINATION 

WE  ended  the  last  chapter  with  what  was  vir- 
tually an  interrogation.    What  is  the  nature 
of   coercive   power   in   the  community,   and 
how,  and  in  what  forms,  is  it  exercised  ? 

Every  association,  by  the  mere  fact  of  its  ex- 
istence, is  endowed  with  some  coercive  power,  and 
actually  exercises  some  such  power  in  the  course  of 
pursuing  its  object.  This  coercive  power  is  not 
necessarily  recognized  by  the  community,  and  the 
courts  of  law  sometimes  disallow  particular  exer- 
cises of  it  by  voluntary  associations.  Nevertheless 
it  exists,  and  is  freely  exercised  every  day.  Very 
many  associations  claim  the  right  to  fine  their  mem- 
bers for  breach  of  the  rules,  and  nearly  all  claim  the 
final  right  of  expelling  a  member  who  offends 
against  the  etiquette  or  rules  of  the  association,  or 
even  who,  in  the  opinion  of  the  members,  acts  con- 
trary to  the  interests  of  the  association.  Trade 
Unions  and  many  other  kinds  of  association  con- 
stantly fine  and  often  expel  members,  and  it  is  very 
seldom  that  their  right  to  do  so  is  challenged  by  the 
courts  in  some  particular  case.  Indeed,  often  the 
law  of  the  State,  so  far  from  disallowing  such  asso- 

128 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     129 

ciational  coercion,  backs  it  up  and  gives  it  legal 
sanction,  or  at  least  acquiesces  in  its  decisions.  This 
is  especially  the  case  in  the  "self-governing"  profes- 
sions, where  the  benchers  of  the  Temple,  or  the 
Law  Society,  or  the  General  Medical  Council,  freely 
use  coercive  power  with  the  approval  and  sanction 
of  the  State.  Thus,  we  can  find  ample  instances  of 
coercion  by  associations  other  than  the  State  with- 
out inviting  that  great  coercionist,  spiritual  and  tem- 
poral, the  Church. 

There  is,  however,  a  distinction  between  three 
kinds  of  coercion,  which  it  is  important  to  recognize 
at  the  outset.  There  is  one  kind  of  coercion  which 
only  affects  a  man's  purse  or  property,  that  is 
coercion  by  fine.  This  is  freely  employed,  not  only 
by  the  State,  but  by  most  important  types  of  associ- 
ation. There  is  a  second  kind  of  coercion  which  af- 
fects a  man's  freedom  of  action  by  limiting  directly 
his  range  of  opportunity  and  self-expression,  as,  for 
instance,  by  disfranchising  him  or  forbidding  him  to 
work  in  a  particular  factory  or  occupation.  The  first 
is  employed  by  the  State  and  also  by  other  forms 
of  association ;  the  second  occurs  when  the  members 
of  a  Trade  Union  refuse  to  work  with  a  non-Union- 
ist,  or  expel  a  man  from  the  Union  and  then  refuse 
to  work  with  him,  or  when  an  employers'  associa- 
tion "blacklists"  a  man,  and  so  prevents  him  from 
getting  a  job.  "Sending  to  Coventry"  is  a  less  or- 
ganized example  of  this  kind  of  coercion. 

The  third  form  of  coercion  is  that  which  directly 
affects  a  man's  body,  by  limiting  his  right  of  move- 
ment, interning  him,  imprisoning  him,  or,  in  the 
last  resort,  hanging  him,  or  shooting  him,  or  cutting 


130  SOCIAL  THEORY 

off  his  head.  In  civilized  countries  and  in  modern 
times  these  forms  of  diversion  are  usually,  at  least 
in  the  case  of  adults,  the  monopoly  of  the  State. 
Civilization,  however,  is  often  ready  to  resort  to 
them  without  calling  in  the  State  in  its  dealings  with 
what  are  politely  called  "non-adult"  races,  and  also, 
in  a  less  degree,  in  the  case  of  children.  The  per- 
sistence of  "lynch  law"  in  some  parts  of  the  "civil- 
ized" world  is  an  exception. 

How  are  these  forms  of  coercion  related  to  the 
functional  theory  of  Society  which  is  propounded 
in  this  book?  Where,  in  other  words,  in  a  func- 
tionally organized  Society,  would  the  power  of  coer- 
cion in  its  various  forms  reside? 

It  is  clearly  useless  to  deny  all  coercive  power  to 
any  association  which  we  are  prepared  to  recognize 
at  all  as  legitimate;  for  whether  we  recognize  the 
right  to  coercion  or  not,  the  power  will  remain  and 
will  be  used.  The  most  that  is  possible  is  to  limit 
the  forms  of  coercion  which  may  be  used  by  any 
particular  functional  association,  and  to  reserve  the 
right  to  the  more  stringent  forms  of  coercion  in 
the  hands  of  that  body  which  is  most  fit  to  exercise 
it.  It  is  futile  to  endeavor  to  prevent  an  associa- 
tion which  is  allowed  to  make  rules,  and  must  make 
rules  if  it  is  to  get  its  work  done  at  all,  from  using 
some  means  to  enforce  their  observance.  Even  if 
an  association  is  deprived  of  the  means  of  coercing 
its  members  directly,  it  will  find  indirect  means  of 
coercing  them  by  placing  obstacles  in  their  way  or 
withholding  opportunities  from  them.  Moreover, 
it  is  impossible  altogether  to  prevent  an  association 
which  exists  to  secure  a  particular  object  from 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     131 

coercing  to  a  certain  extent  persons  not  its  members 
who  refuse  to  join  it  and  pursue  a  contrary  object 
or  the  same  object  in  a  different  way.  Here,  again, 
the  range  and  forms  of  coercion  can  be  limited,  but 
the  possibility  of  coercion  cannot  be  altogether 
abolished. 

In  a  functionally  organized  Society,  it  seems 
reasonable  to  suppose  that  each  functional  associa- 
tion will  employ  directly  the  minor  forms  of  coer- 
cion in  relation  to  its  own  members,  acting  within 
strictly  limited  powers,  and  without  the  right  to  in- 
terfere with  life  or  liberty  of  person.  This,  how- 
ever, only  drives  us  back  upon  a  further  question. 
What  body  in  a  functionally  organized  Society  will 
define  the  limits  within  which  coercion  may  be  em- 
ployed by  the  various  associations,  and  itself  exer- 
cise directly  the  major  forms  of  coercion,  if  and 
when  they  are  required? 

It  is  not  difficult  to  recognize  that  this  question 
brings  us  back  to  the  very  point  at  which  we  broke 
off  in  our  discussion  of  the  State.1  We  were  there 
confronted  with  the  question  of  the  body  which 
would,  in  a  functional  Society,  exercise  the  powers 
of  coordination  at  present  claimed  by  the  "Sov- 
ereign State."  But  clearly  coordination  and  co- 
ercion go  hand  in  hand. 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  restate  more  clearly 
and  fully  the  reasons  which  make  it  impossible  to 
recognize  the  task  of  coordination  as  falling  within 
the  true  function  of  the  State.  The  claim  on  the 
State's  behalf  is  usually  based  on  the  assumption 
that  the  State,  because  it  represents  and  includes 
1  See  Chapter  V. 


132  SOCIAL  THEORY 

everybody  within  its  area,  is  necessarily  superior  to 
other  associations  which  only  include  some  of  the 
persons  within  its  area.1  But  in  what  sense  does  the 
State  represent  and  include  everybody?  If  our 
functional  theory  of  representation  is  right,  it  may 
include  everybody,  but  it  does  not  include  the  whole 
of  everybody ;  it  may  represent  some  purposes  com- 
mon to  everybody,  but  it  does  not  represent  all  the 
purposes  common  to  everybody.  This  being  so,  it 
can  no  longer  lay  claim  to  Sovereignty  on  the  ground 
that  it  represents  and  includes  everybody;  for  the 
Sovereign,  if  there  is  one,  must  'represent  and 
include,  as  far  as  possible,  the  whole  of  every- 
body. 

This  it  is  impossible  for  any  single  association 
to-day,  and  indeed  impossible  for  any  complex  of 
associations  to  do  completely.  For  there  are  vast 
tracts  of  life  which  are  simply  not  susceptible  to 
social  organization,  and  the  purposes  which  they 
include  are  therefore  not  capable  of  being  repre- 
sented at  all.  This  is,  however,  only  a  statement  in 
other  words  of  a  fact  which  we  have  already  recog- 
nized that,  as  the  State  is  not  co-extensive  with  or- 
ganized Society,  so  Society  is  not  co-extensive  with 
community. 

The  principle  of  coordination  which  we  are 
seeking  cannot  therefore  be  a  principle  coordinating 
all  life  within  a  given  area,  but  only  that  part  of  life 
which  is  social  and  susceptible  to  social  organiza- 
tion. But  it  must  coordinate  the  whole  of  that  or- 
ganizable  social  life.  It  cannot  therefore  be  found 

*The  fact  that  they  may  also  include  persons  outside  the 
State's  area  is  usually  ignored. 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     133 

in  any  one  of  the  various  forms  of  association  which 
we  have  described;  for  to  each  of  these  forms  all 
the  others  are  external,  and  no  one  of  them  could 
act  as  a  coordinating  agency  either  between  the 
others  or  between  itself  and  the  rest.  We  are  there- 
fore reduced  to  the  conclusion  that  no  one  among 
the  many  forms  of  functional  association  can  be 
the  coordinating  body  of  which  we  are  in  search. 

A  dim  perception  of  this  difficulty  has  led  social 
theorists  into  a  variety  of  expedients.  Some  have 
maintained,  like  Rousseau,  that  Sovereignty  resides 
inalienably  in  the  whole  body  of  the  people  and  is 
incapable  of  being  conferred  upon  any  form  of 
organization  at  all.  But  such  a  view  inevitably 
encounters  the  difficulty  that,  although  the  Sover- 
eignty of  the  people  is  affirmed,  no  means  can  be 
found  of  making  it  actual,  and  all  the  important 
exercises  of  it  pass  into  the  hands  of  governing 
bodies  which  thus  become  virtually  sovereign,  even 
while  their  Sovereignty  is  being  denied.1 

Where  this  difficulty  is  recognized  as  being 
insuperable,  at  least  in  any  large  Society,  the  at- 
tempt is  sometimes  made  to  preserve  popular  Sov- 
ereignty by  the  constant  use  of  the  referendum.  But 
a  mere  "Yes  or  No"  vote,  without  the  possibility 
of  discussion  or  amendment,  reduces  popular  Sover- 
eignty to  a  farce  except  on  the  broadest  issues,  and 
once  more  the  real  power  passes  to  the  Government, 
or  to  whoever  draws  up  the  ballot  papers  and  so 
decides  the  form  of  the  question  to  be  submitted. 
None  of  these  mechanical  expedients  really  gets  over 

1  See  my  Introduction  to  Rousseau's  Social  Contract  (Ev- 
eryman edition),  p.  xxvi. 


134.  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  difficulty.  The  referendum  may  be  the  best 
way  of  dealing  with  certain  simple  issues;  but  by 
itself  it  certainly  does  not  maintain  popular  Sover- 
eignty; nor  does  the  addition  of  the  initiative  to 
it  make  any  substantial  difference. 

If  neither  any  single  functional  association  nor  the 
people  itself  can  be  the  normal  coordinating  agency 
in  a  functionally  organized  Society,  only  one  possi- 
bility remains.  The  coordinating  body  must  be 
not  any  single  association,  but  a  combination  of  asso- 
ciations, a  federal  body  in  which  some  or  all  of 
the  various  functional  associations  are  linked  to- 
gether. 

It  will  be  remembered  that,  in  the  chapter  on 
"The  Forms  and  Motives  of  Association,"  some 
attempt  was  made  to  discriminate  between  essential 
and  non-essential  forms  of  association.  It  was 
recognized  that  any  such  discrimination  could  be 
only  approximate,  because  even  the  essential  forms 
would  tend  to  vary  in  different  times  and  places. 
We  did,  however,  succeed  in  establishing  a  working 
principle  of  discrimination.  "The  key  to  essen- 
tiality," we  saw,  "is  the  performance  of  some  func- 
tion which  is  vital  to  the  coherent  working  of 
Society,  and  without  which  Society  would  be  lop- 
sided or  incomplete."  We  saw  there  that,  apart 
from  religious  association,  which  we  reserved  for 
special  treatment,  there  are  at  least  three  forms  of 
association  which  are  to  be  regarded  as  generally 
essential.  These  are  political  association  and  the 
two  forms  of  "economic"  association  or  rather  of 
association  centering  round  the  giving  and  receiving 
of  services,  that  is  to  say,  vocational  and  appetitive 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     135 

association.1  We  saw  also  that  the  essentiality  of 
these  forms  of  association  in  general  does  not  suffice 
to  establish  the  essentiality  of  any  particular 
association  belonging  to  one  of  these  forms,  unless 
two  further  conditions  are  satisfied.  The  motive 
which  binds  men  together  in  the  association  must 
be  a  truly  "associative"  motive,2  and  the  content 
or  function  of  the  particular  association,  and  not 
merely  of  its  form,  must  be  important  enough  to 
warrant  its  being  regarded  as  "essential"  in  accord- 
ance with  the  criterion  stated  above. 

I  do  not  propose  to  push  further  in  this  book  the 
analysis  of  the  essential  forms  and  instances  of 
association.  To  determine  what  actual  associations 
are  to  be  regarded  as  essential  at  a  particular  time 
and  for  a  particular  Society  is  a  practical  question, 
and  is  therefore  alien  to  a  work  dealing  with  Social 
Theory.3  Here  we  are  concerned  only  with  the 
general  question — with  the  attempt  to  discover  the 
principle  of  coordination  in  a  functionally  organized 
Society. 

This  principle  has  already  been  made  inferentially 
clear.  The  coordinating  agency  can  only  be  a 
combination,  not  of  all  associations,  but  of  all 
essential  associations,  a  Joint  Council  or  Congress 
of  the  supreme  bodies  representing  each  of  the  main 
functions  in  Society.  Each  functional  association 
will  see  to  the  execution  of  its  own  function,  and  for 
the  coordination  of  the  activities  of  the  various 

1  See  Chapter  IV.,  pp.  63  ff. 

*  For  the  definition  of  "associative"  motive,  see  pp.  34  ff. 

*  For  a  discussion  on  this  point,  see  my  Self -Government  in 
Industry,  especially  the  chapter  on  the  State  and  the  introduc- 
tory chapter  prefixed  to  the  edition  of  1919. 


186  SOCIAL  THEORY 

associations  there  must  be  a  joint  body  representa- 
tive of  them. 

Here  a  serious  objection  will  almost  certainly  be 
encountered.  Is  not  this,  it  will  be  asked,  merely  a 
very  roundabout  way  of  proposing  a  change  in  the 
method  of  electing  the  representatives  who  form  the 
State?  It  has  often  been  proposed  that  the  prin- 
ciple of  vocational  electorates  should  be  partially 
recognized  and  incorporated  in  the  constitution  side 
by  side  with  the  geographical  principle — that,  for 
example,  the  House  of  Lords  should  be  replaced  by 
a  vocational  Second  Chamber.  It  will  be  suggested 
that,  after  all  our  blare  of  trumpets,  this  is  what  our 
"great  change"  comes  to  in  the  end. 

This  is  not  so.  There  are  two  absolutely  vital 
differences  between  the  theory  which  I  have  been 
putting  forward  and  the  proposal  to  establish  a 
vocational  Second  Chamber. 

In  the  first  place,  the  assumption  of  the  "Voca- 
tional Chamber"  theory  is  that  all  forms  of  legis- 
lation, no  matter  what  their  content,  continue  to  be 
dealt  with  by  both  Chambers  and  initiated  in  either. 
Functional  organization,  on  the  other  hand,  is  ex- 
plicitly designed  to  enable  each  functional  body  to 
deal  with  those  matters  which  belong  to  its  function, 
without  interference  in  its  normal  operations  from 
any  outside  body.  Thus,  purely  political  questions 
belong  exclusively  to  the  sphere  of  the  State,  purely 
vocational  questions  to  the  sphere  of  vocational  as- 
sociation. It  is  only  when  a  question  affects  more 
than  one  form  of  association,  that  is,  affects  men  in 
more  than  one  capacity  or  function,  that  it  is  neces- 
sary to  appeal  beyond  the  purely  functional  body  to 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     137 

some  body  on  which  the  various  functions  are  repre- 
sented. The  whole  basis  of  functional  organization 
is  designed  to  enable  each  functional  body  to  get  on 
with  its  own  job — the  job  which  the  members  know 
how  to  do,  and  by  virtue  of  their  common  interest 
in  which  they  have  become  associated. 

Secondly,  the  coordinating  or  "joint"  body 
which  I  have  in  mind  is  less  an  administrative  or 
legislative  body,  though  it  cannot  help  partaking  in 
some  degree  of  both  these  characters,  than  a  court  of 
appeal.  It  does  not  in  the  normal  case  initiate;  it 
decides.  It  is  not  so  much  a  legislature  as  a  con- 
stitutional judiciary,  or  democratic  Supreme  Court 
of  Functional  Equity. 

If  this  is  clear,  we  can  return  to  the  question  from 
which  we  were  led  into  this  discussion.  Coercion 
and  coordination,  we  said,  go  hand  in  hand.  If  the 
supreme  power  of  coordination  rests  in  the  hands 
of  this  "joint"  body  compounded  from  the  essential 
functional  associations,  it  seems  clear  that  the 
supreme  power  of  coercion  must  rest  in  the  same 
hands.  This  involves  that  the  judiciary  and  the 
whole  paraphernalia  of  law  and  police  must  be  under 
the  control  of  the  coordinating  body. 

We  saw  in  the  last  chapter  that  the  functional 
organization  of  Society  necessarily  involves  the 
division  of  power  of  legislation,  as  well  as  of  ad- 
ministration, along  functional  lines.  It  does  not, 
however,  involve  a  similar  division  of  the  judiciary. 
This  question,  it  will  be  remembered,  we  reserved 
for  further  treatment,  our  reason  being  that  it  could 
not  be  dealt  with  until  we  came  to  discuss  the 
questions  of  coordination  and  coercion. 


138  SOCIAL  THEORY 

The  sole  possession  of  a  high  degree  of  coercive 
power,  and  especially  of  coercive  power  of  the  third 
kind,  which  directly  affects  a  man's  body,  by  any 
single  form  of  functional  association,  would  clearly 
upset  the  social  balance  at  which  we  are  aiming, 
and  place  the  ultimate  social  power  in  the  hands  of 
that  form  of  association.  On  the  other  hand,  its 
possession  in  an  equal  degree  by  each  of  the  essential 
forms  of  association  would  be  not  only,  to  say  the 
least  of  it,  inconvenient,  and  an  invitation  to  the 
sort  of  cat-and-dog  fight  which  went  on  between 
Church  and  State  in  the  Middle  Ages,  but  also  a 
denial  of  the  relation  of  men  to  association  which 
is  postulated  as  fundamental  in  this  study.  We 
have  seen  that  a  man  is  a  member  of  an  association, 
not  with  his  whole  personality,  but  with  that  part 
of  it  which  he  puts  into  the  association  in  pursuance 
of  the  common  object  which  is  its  function.  This 
being  so,  the  association  has  at  the  most  no  right  to 
coerce  the  individual  in  his  whole  personality,  but 
only  in  that  part  of  it  which  he  has  put  into  the 
association.  The  right  to  the  higher  forms  of  coer- 
cion cannot,  then,  reside  either  in  any  one  associa- 
tion or  in  all  such  associations.  It  must,  however, 
be  in  the  hands  of  a  single  body,  if  only  for  reasons 
of  convenience;  and  this  body  can  therefore  only  be 
the  coordinating  body  which  is  a  synthesis  of  the 
various  essential  forms  of  association. 

Even  so,  there  is  a  strict  limit  to  the  coercive 
power  to  which  even  the  coordinating  body  is 
entitled.  For,  as  we  have  seen,  the  individual  puts 
into  Society,  that  is  into  social  organization,  not 
his  whole  personality,  but  only  those  parts  of  it 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     139 

which  can  find  expression  through  social  organiza- 
tion. The  coercive  right  of  Society  as  a  whole  is 
therefore  limited,  and  there  remains  a  sphere  un- 
touched by  social  organization  in  which  the  indi- 
vidual retains  his  freedom  from  coercion.1  It  fol- 
lows that  Society  has  no  right  to  put  any  man  to 
death;  for  death  involves  a  total  cessation  of  per- 
sonality— on  this  earth,  at  any  rate. 

Even  with  this  safeguard,  I  rather  suspect  that 
many  readers  have  been  regarding  what  has  been 
said  in  this  chapter  with  a  good  deal  of  suspicion 
and  dislike.  So  much  talk  about  coercion,  they 
will  say,  augurs  ill  for  the  sort  of  Society  which 
requires  it.  What  is  wanted,  they  will  urge,  is  to 
get  away  from  the  whole  idea  of  coercion  as  the 
basis  of  Society ;  for  it  is  its  coercive  character  that 
makes  the  State  such  a  nasty  body. 

But  it  is  of  no  use  to  refuse  to  talk  about  a  thing 
because  one  does  not  happen  to  like  it.  However 
much  one  may  dislike  coercion  and  seek  to  reduce 
its  operation  in  Society  to  a  minimum,  it  is  necessary 
to  provide  for  its  exercise,  if  only  to  supply  a  means 
for  its  abolition.  For  only  that  body  which  possesses 
coercive  power  is  in  a  position  to  forego  or  prohibit 
its  exercise. 

Having  discovered  where  coercive  power  must 
reside  in  a  functional  Society,  we  are  now  in  a  posi- 
tion to  give  vent  to  our  dislike  of  it.  One  of  the 
greatest  results  which,  I  believe,  would  flow  from  the 
full  recognition  of  functional  organization  would 
be  a  substantial  and  immediate  reduction  in  the  use 
of  coercion  in  Society.  For  coercion  is  the  conse- 
1  For  a  development  of  this  point,  see  Chapter  XII. 


140  SOCIAL  THEORY 

quence  of  social  disorder,  and  the  need  for  it  largely 
comes,  not  of  innate  human  wickedness,  but  of 
men's  failure  under  existing  social  conditions  to 
find  their  proper  spheres  of  social  service  and  to 
recognize  clearly  their  rights  and  obligations  in  So- 
ciety. If  we  set  our  social  house  in  order  and 
make  it  easier  for  men  to  recognize  their  proper 
sphere  of  social  service,  the  need  for  coercion  will,  I 
believe,  speedily  and  progressively  disappear.1 

Moreover,  there  is  another  huge  advantage  of 
functional  Society  over  State  Sovereignty.  The 
theory  of  the  Sovereign  State  means  that  the  pigmy, 
man,  is  confronted  by  the  leviathan,  State,  which 
encircles  and  absorbs  him  wholly,  or  at  least  claims 
the  absolute  right  to  encircle  and  absorb  him.  It 
claims  to  "represent"  fully  all  the  individuals  who 
are  its  members,  and  therefore  to  be  absolutely 
superior  to  them  and  over  them,  and  to  come  always 
first.  The  functional  principle  destroys  any  such 
claim;  for  its  denial  that  the  individual  can  be 
"represented"  in  any  complete  sense  means  -that 
social  organization,  however  vast  and  complicated 
it  may  be,  leaves  the  individual  intact  and  self-sub- 
sistent,  distributing  his  loyalties  and  obligations 
among  a  number  of  functional  bodies,  but  not  ab- 
sorbed in  any  or  all  of  them,  because  outside  the 
sphere  of  functional  organization  there  remains 
always  that  most  vital  sphere  of  individuality  whose 
self-expression  is  essentially  personal  and  incapable 
of  being  organized.  The  functional  principle  is, 

1  This  view  appears  to  be  also  largely  that  of  Mr.  Bertrand 
Russell,  who  adopts  Guild  Socialism  as  a  step  towards  a  non- 
coercive  Society.  See  his  Roads  to  Freedom. 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     141 

above  all  else,  the  recognition  of  the  absolute  and 
inalienable  personal  identity  of  every  individual 
person.1 

There  is  one  further  point  with  which  we  must 
deal  before  bringing  this  chapter  to  an  end.  In 
dealing  with  the  nature  of  the  State,  we  discussed 
briefly  the  international  aspects  of  social  organiza- 
tion. We  saw  that  international  action,  or  the  ex- 
ternal actions  of  a  particular  Society,  have  their 
various  functional  aspects,  in  which  they  fall  within 
the  sphere  of  the  various  forms  of  functional  asso- 
ciation. There  remain  those  parts  of  international 
or  external  action  which  involve  more  than  one 
function  or  call  for  action  by  Society  as  a  whole. 
Foremost  among  these  there  will  no  doubt  leap  to 
the  mind  of  the  reader  the  control  of  armed  forces 
— the  Army,  Navy  and  Air  Force.  Where,  in  a 
functional  Society,  would  the  control  of  these 
reside?  Who  would  declare  war  or  make  peace  or 
treaties  and  covenants  affecting  Society  as  a  whole  ? 
Who  would  represent  a  functional  Society  in  a 
League  of  Nations? 

The  answers  to  all  these  questions  follow  logically 
from  what  has  already  been  established.  The 
external  use  of  force  and  coercion  raises  similar 
problems  to  its  internal  use,  and  it  is  even  more 
manifest  in  external  relations  that  the  right  to  use  it 
must  be  concentrated  in  the  hands  of  a  single  body. 
One  part  of  Society  cannot  be  at  peace  while  another 

1  For  a  fuller  discussion  of  this  point,  see  my  paper  on  "Con- 
flicting Social  Obligations"  (Proceedings  of  the  Aristotelian 
Society,  1915-16),  and  the  chapter  on  "The  Organization  of 
Freedom"  in  my  Labor  in  the  Commonwealth. 


143  SOCIAL  THEORY 

part  is  at  war;  for  the  claims  of  war  upon  the 
individual  citizen  are  not  limited  to  an  eight  hours' 
day,  or  to  the  act  of  voting;  they  involve  for  him 
the  risk  of  death  by  violence  or  starvation.  No  less 
clearly  is  it  impossible  to  entrust  external  force  to 
any  single  functional  association,  both  because 
external  affairs  involve  and  interest  all  the  essential 
forms  of  association,  and  because  force  intended 
for  use  externally  is  also  available  for  internal  use, 
and  sole  control  of  armed  forces  would  make  the 
association  which  possessed  it  the  master  of  Society. 
We  must,  therefore,  once  more  conclude  that  the 
external,  like  the  internal,  means  of  coercion,  must 
be  in  the  hands  of  the  body  which  represents  the 
various  social  functions,  and  is  entrusted  with  the 
task  of  coordination. 

Here,  again,  I  am  dealing  with  the  problem  of 
external  force,  not  because  Armies  and  Navies  and 
wars  are  nice  things,  but  because,  whether  they  are 
nice  or  nasty,  the  problem  which  they  present  has 
to  be  faced.  I  hope  with  all  my  heart  that  they  will 
disappear  before  the  growth  of  international  coop- 
eration, not  only  between  States,  but  between  all 
the  various  forms  of  functional  association. 
Moreover,  I  believe  that  functional  association, 
which  has  already  shown  itself  far  ahead  of  States 
in  its  sense  of  international  solidarity,  offers  the 
best  hope  of  a  condition  of  World  Society  which 
will  make  external  force  unnecessary,  and  will  also 
persuade  everybody,  except  the  incorrigible  and 
disappointed  militarists,  that  it  is  unnecessary. 

Here,  then,  is  the  answer  to  our  last  question — 
Who  would  represent  a  functional  Society  on  a 


COERCION  AND  CO-ORDINATION     143 

League  of  Nations?  The  answer  is  that  an  inter- 
national Society,  which  in  embryo  a  League  of 
Nations  is,  if  it  is  anything  more  than  a  sham, 
would  reproduce  in  itself  the  functional  structure 
of  the  smaller  Societies  composing  it.  Inter- 
national functional  association  "would  undertake, 
in  the  wider  sphere,  the  work  undertaken  in  the 
narrower  sphere  by  national  functional  organization, 
and  the  central  coordinating  body  would  reproduce 
internationally  the  federal  structure  of  the  national 
coordinating  bodies.  This,  no  doubt,  assumes  a  cer- 
tain homogeneity  of  structure  among  the  Socie- 
ties composing  the  League;  but  it  is  at  least  doubtful 
whether,  without  a  considerable  element  of  homo- 
geneity, a  League  of  Nations  could  possibly  work. 
A  perception  of  this  perhaps  accounts  for  the  desire 
of  the  "Sovereign  States,"  which  have  just  formed 
a  League,  to  impress  upon  all  candidates  for  entry 
the  particular  structure,  economic  and  political, 
which  they  themselves  possess.1 

1  This  point  is  further  discussed  in  my  Labor  in  the  Com- 
monwealth, chap.  ii. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY 

THERE  will  be  a  certain  type  of  reader  who 
will  regard  the  greater  part  of  this  book  as 
beside  the  point,  or  at  best  as  a  harmless  form 
of  theoretical  diversion.  I  am  ignoring,  he  will  say, 
or  relegating  to  a  quite  secondary  position  the  factor 
which  in  reality  dominates  and  determines  the 
whole  course  of  social  organization.  Political  or- 
ganization, and  indeed  every  essential  form  of  asso- 
ciative life,  is,  in  his  view,  the  result  of  economic 
conditions  and  of  the  distribution  of  economic 
power  in  the  community,  and  the  changes  which 
occur  from  time  to  time  in  social  organization  are 
equally  the  results  of  changes  in  the  economic 
circumstances.  In  the  words  of  Marx  and  Engels, 
"The  economic  structure  of  Society  is  the  real 
basis  on  which  the  judicial  and  political  super- 
structure is  raised — in  short,  the  mode  of  produc- 
tion determines  the  character  of  the  social,  polit- 
ical, and  intellectual  life  generally." 

It  is  necessary  for  us  to  take  notice  of  this  point 
of  view,  and  to  admit  at  once  the  large  measure  of 
truth  which  it  possesses,  if  our  exposition  of  the 
theoretical  basis  of  Society  is  to  have  any  vital 

144 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    145 

contact  with  the  working  of  actual  Societies.  In- 
deed, we  have  already,  at  several  stages  of  our 
argument,  laid  stress  on  the  vital  importance  of  the 
economic  factor  in  influencing  and  directing  the 
working  of  other  forms  of  association,  as  well  as  the 
interaction  of  various  economic  factors  and  associa- 
tions. We  have,  however,  always  treated  the  in- 
fluence of  economic  factors  upon  non-economic 
forms  of  association  as  a  form  of  perversion,  lead- 
ing to  a  failure  of  the  association  so  affected  to  ful- 
fill its  proper  function  in  Society.  If  the  Marxian 
thesis  is  right  in  its  entirety,  we  must  abandon  this 
view;  for  it  is  folly  to  regard  as  "perversion"  a 
phenomenon  which  flows  directly  from  the  nature  of 
Society  itself,  or  to  treat  as  independent  forms  of 
association  bodies  and  manifestations  which  are 
only  the  "superstructure"  of  economic  organiza- 
tion. 

In  fact,  we  are  here  faced  by  a  theory  which  is  the 
complete  inversion  of  the  theory  of  State  Sover- 
eignty which  we  have  already  rejected.  Having 
pulled  down  the  State  from  its  pedestal,  we  are  asked 
to  install  the  economic  structure  of  Society  in  its 
place.  There  is,  however,  a  profound  difference  in 
the  argument  advanced.  Although  the  claim  of  the 
State  to  Sovereignty  is  sometimes  based  on  the  fact 
that  it  is  the  sole  repository  of  armed  force,  this 
argument  is  not  very  often  or  very  persistently  em- 
ployed ;  for  it  is  clear  that  there  is  no  reason  in  the 
nature  of  the  State  why  it  should  occupy  this 
position,  and  also  increasingly  clear  that  there  exist 
other  forms  of  "force,"  such  as  the  strike,  which 
may  under  favorable  conditions  successfully 


146  SOCIAL  THEORY 

challenge  even  a  monopolist  in  armed  force.  The 
case  for  State  Sovereignty  is  therefore  usually  ar- 
gued not  on  this  basis  of  fact,  but  on  what  is  put 
forward  as  a  basis  of  right.  The  State  is  said  to  be 
sovereign,  because  it  represents  everybody. 

The  argument  that  the  economic  structure  of 
Society  is,  if  I  may  use  the  term,  "sovereign,"  is 
based  on  quite  different  grounds.  It  is  not  as  a 
rule  suggested  that  economic  conditions  ought 
to  be  the  supreme  determinant  in  Society,  but  only 
that  they  are  and  must  be,  owing  to  the  operation 
of  forces  beyond  our  control.  The  advocates  of 
this  theory — the  "materialist"  or  "economic"  con- 
ception of  history — are  indeed  apt  to  be  impatient 
of  "oughts"  and  rights.  They  claim  that  their 
conception  is  "scientific,"  and  base  it  upon  the  stern 
laws  of  necessity  and  material  evolution.  Whatever 
fine  theories  other  people  may  spin,  they  continue 
to  proclaim  the  hard  fact  that  the  human  race 
marches  upon  its  belly,  and  that  the  economic  order 
of  Society  determines  everything  else. 

Whatever  the  process  of  argument,  the  result  ar- 
rived at  is  in  one  respect  the  same  as  that  arrived 
at  by  the  advocates  of  State  Sovereignty.  Func- 
tional organization  in  either  case  disappears,  or 
appears  only  as  a  subordinate  form  determined  by 
and  existing  on  the  sufferance  of  a  single  form  of 
organization,  which,  even  if  it  has  a  functional  basis, 
is  not  in  its  operation  confined  to  any  particular 
function. 

There  is,  however,  still  an  ambiguity  in  the 
materialist  conception.  What  is  meant  by  the 
words,  "the  economic  structure  of  Society"?  Do 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    147 

they  refer  to  actual  associations,  such  as  Trade 
Unions  or  capitalist  associations,  andlo  the  distri- 
bution of  power  among  such  associations?  Or  do 
they,  as  the  final  clause  of  our  quotation  from  Marx 
and  Engels  rather  seems  to  suggest,  refer  to  the 
actual  material  conditions  existing  in  Society, 
without  regard  to  the  associations  which  are  re- 
lated to  these  conditions  ? 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  direct  reference  is  not 
to  associations  but  to  the  material  conditions 
themselves.  But  it  is  held  that  each  set  of  material 
conditions  finds  its  necessary  expression  in  a  set  of 
associations  and  a  form  of  social  organization  of  its 
own.  Thus,  one  set  of  associations  corresponded  to, 
and  arose  out  of,  the  productive  conditions  of 
primitive  Society;  another  set  was  the  inevitable 
result  of  the  productive  conditions  of  the  Middle 
Ages ;  and  yet  another  set,  under  which  we  are  now 
living,  has  been  called  into  existence  by  the  great 
inventions  and  the  development  of  large-scale 
production  which  marked  the  period  of  the  In- 
dustrial Revolution.  Each  set  of  economic  condi- 
tions changes  gradually,  with  or  without  a  sharp 
break  or  upheaval  at  some  point,  into  the  next, 
and  each  new  set  of  associations  grows  and  is  built 
up  gradually  within  the  old,  until  the  conditions 
are  ripe  for  it  to  assert  its  dominance,  and  for  the 
obsolete  set  of  associations  to  be  discarded.  Thus, 
within  the  capitalist  system,  a  new  set  of  associa- 
tions is  being  built  up  which  will  take  the  place  of 
Capitalism;  but  those  new  associations,  Trade 
Unions  and  other  working-class  bodies,  are  as  much 


148  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  products  of  economic  conditions  as  the  capitalist 
system  itself. 

As  an  analysis  of  the  growth  of  Capitalism,  and 
of  the  working  of  capitalist  institutions  both  in  the 
past  and  at  the  present  time,  this  theory  is  so  largely 
right  that  the  points  at  which  it  is  wrong  are  easily 
overlooked.  Yet  there  are  at  least  two  considerable 
misstatements  involved  in  it,  as  it  is  most  com- 
monly expressed. 

In  the  first  place,  it  does  not  prove,  as  is  often 
contended,  that  the  form  of  non-economic  associa- 
tions is  determined  by  economic  conditions,  but 
only  that  their  actual  working  and  methods  of 
operation  are  so  determined.  Thus,  when  a  prom- 
inent Marxist 1  writes  a  book  to  prove  that  the 
State  as  an  association  is  the  political  expression  of 
Capitalism  and  will  disappear  with  the  overthrow 
of  Capitalism,  what  he  actually  does  prove  is  that, 
while  Capitalism  exists  as  the  dominant  social 
form,  the  State  will  be  forced  to  do  the  bidding  of 
Capitalism,  and  will  be,  in  actual  fact,  the  political 
expression  of  the  dominant  economic  power  of 
the  capitalist  classes.  What  he  does  not  prove  is 
that,  with  the  overthrow  of  Capitalism,  the  State 
will  disappear ;  or  that  it  will  not  be  able  to  assume 
and  exercise  its  true  function  as  soon  as  the  eco- 
nomic pressure  of  Capitalism  is  removed. 

In  other  words,  his  argument  does  not  in  any 
sense  disprove  our  thesis  that  what  occurs  under 
Capitalism  is  a  perversion  of  the  true  function  of 
the  State,  and  its  use,  not  as  a  political  instrument 
of  the  whole  people,  but  as  a  secondary  economico- 
*The  State:  its  Origin  and  Function.  By  William  Paul. 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    149 

political  instrument  by  the  dominant  economic 
class. 

Secondly,  although  the  State  is  in  fact  largely  an 
"Executive  Committee  for  administering  the  affairs 
of  the  capitalist  class,"  it  is  not  exclusively  so. 
Perversion  of  function  is  not  carried  so  far  as  to 
obliterate  all  signs  and  traces  of  its  real  function. 
Indeed,  by  examining  the  actual  working  of  the 
State,  even  under  capitalist  conditions,  we  have  been 
able  to  assign  to  it  its  essential  function  in  a  ration- 
ally ordered  Society.  Under  any  economic  system 
the  State  will  continue  to  exercise  functions  which 
are  not  economic,  and  the  perversion  of  its  activi- 
ties by  economic  causes  will  not  extend  continuously 
to  all  its  doings. 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  line  of  argument  which  I 
am  adopting  is  an  endorsement  of  a  large  part  of 
the  Marxian  case.  While  I  cannot  accept  the  neo- 
Marxian  criticism  of  the  State  as  universally  true, 
or  as  touching  the  State  in  its  real  social  function, 
I  am  accepting  its  general  truth  as  it  applies  to  the 
State  of  to-day.  It  is  the  case  that  the  functioning, 
not  only  of  the  State,  but  also  of  most  other  forms 
of  association,  including  the  economic  forms  them- 
selves perhaps  more  than  any,  is  perverted  by  the 
influence  exercised  upon  them  by  economic  factors. 

Nor  is  the  reason  for  this  widespread  perversion 
far  to  seek.  It  is  embedded  in  the  present  economic 
structure  of  Society.  For,  instead  of  being  organ- 
ized as  a  coherent  whole  for  the  complementary 
performance  of  social  functions,  men  are  to-day 
organized  in  the  economic  sphere  in  conflicting 
groups,  each  of  which  is  at  least  as  much  concerned 


150  SOCIAL  THEORY 

with  getting  the  better  of  the  others  and  diverting 
to  its  own  use  as  much  as  possible  of  the  product  of 
labor  as  with  serving  the  community  by  the  per- 
formance of  a  useful  function.  Thus  the  economic 
sphere  of  social  action  has  become  a  battle-ground 
of  contending  sections,  and  these  combatants  are 
also  irresistibly  impelled  to  widen  their  battle- 
front  so  as  to  lay  waste  the  tracts  of  social  organiza- 
tion which  lie  outside  the  economic  sphere.  Thus, 
trade  rivalries  lead  to  wars  between  nations ;  internal 
industrial  dissension  leads  employers'  associations 
and  Trade  Unions  to  seek  direct  representation  in 
Parliament,  and  to  extend  into  the  political  sphere 
their  economic  disputes;  and  finally,  the  whole 
people  tends  to  rally  to  the  one  standard  or  the 
other,  and  to  make  Society  as  a  whole  a  "devas- 
tated area"  of  economic  conflict  and  class-war. 

I  am  not  concerned  to  insist  here  on  my  belief 
that  Labor  is  in  the  right,  and  Capitalism  in  the 
wrong  in  this  struggle,  but  solely  to  insist  that, 
wherever  the  right  lies,  the  existence  of  such  an 
economic  conflict  in  Society  is  fatal  to  the  due  per- 
formance of  its  function  by  each  form  of  social 
organization.  Indeed,  this  statement  can  be  made 
more  general;  for  economic  conflict  is  not  the  only 
sort  of  division  that  can  so  rend  a  community 
asunder  as  largely  to  stop  the  functioning  of 
its  various  parts.  Religious  differences,  as  we  shall 
see  later,  can  produce  and  have  produced  the  same 
results,  and  there  is  no  final  reason  why  some 
other  matter  of  discord  should  not  produce  them 
if  it  arouses  strong  enough  feelings  in  a  sufficient 
part  of  the  population.  We  may  say,  then,  that 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    151 

the  existence  of  a  profound  social  cleavage  in  regard 
to  the  fulfillment  of  any  essential  social  function 
is  prejudicial,  and  may  be  fatal,  to  the  performance 
of  its  proper  function  by  each  form  of  social 
organization. 

In  our  own  Society  at  least,  and  in  the  larger 
industrialized  communities  generally,  economic 
divisions  are  at  the  present  time  the  principal  ob- 
stacles to  the  fulfillment  of  social  functions. 
Great  inequalities  of  wealth  and  economic  status 
lead  inevitably,  under  the  modern  conditions  which 
necessarily  favor  large-scale  combination  on  both 
sides,  to  cleavages  in  Society  that  are  bound  to 
assume  the  character  of  open  conflicts.  It  is 
therefore  useless  to  expect  that  the  various  forms 
of  association  will  perform  their  functions  properly 
as  long  as  the  conditions  which  make  for  such 
conflicts  continue  in  existence.  The  only  remedy 
lies  in  some  form  of  approximate,  or  comparatively 
economic  equality. 

It  must  be  made  clear  that  this  assertion  is  not 
a  plea  for,  or  a  declaration  of  faith  in,  any  par- 
ticular economic  system,  even  if  faith  in  a  particular 
system  is  implied  in  much  of  this  book.  Compara- 
tive or  approximate  economic  equality  is  possible 
under  more  than  one  system,  and  I  am  Marxian 
enough  to  believe  that  different  systems  are  re- 
quired for  its  attainment  under  different  economic 
and  productive  systems.  Thus,  a  generally  diffused 
system  of  peasant  proprietorship,  such  as  Mr. 
Belloc  and  his  followers  have  made  an  undeniably 
heroic  theoretical  attempt  to  adapt  to  the  conditions 


152  SOCIAL  THEORY 

of  modern  industrialized  Societies,1  is  certainly  a 
possible  approximation  to  equality  for  an  agrarian 
Society,  and  under  it  such  a  Society  might  hope  to 
find  its  various  functional  associations  doing  their 
jobs  with  some  approximation  to  propriety.  All 
the  various  schools  of  Socialist  thought — Collectiv- 
ist,  Communist,  Guild  Socialist,  Syndicalist — set  out 
to  provide  a  basis  for  economic  equality  on  the 
opposite  principle,  not  of  the  general  diffusion  and 
distribution,  but  of  the  concentration  and  social 
ownership  of  the  means  of  production.  Any  of  these 
systems,  whatever  their  other  faults,  might,  given 
an  appropriate  set  of  material  conditions  as  a  basis, 
provide  economic  equality  and  thereby  make  possible 
the  functioning  of  Society  without  perversion  from 
economic  causes.  But  without  virtual  economic 
equality  it  is  useless  to  look  for  the  disappearance' 
or  subordination  of  class-conflict,  and  therefore 
useless  to  expect  Society  to  function  aright,  either 
economically  or  in  any  other  sphere. 

In  granting  so  much  to  the  "materialists,"  how- 
ever, we  must  be  careful  to  make  clear  what  we  do 
not  grant.  Although  Society  does  in  one  sense  walk 
upon  its  belly,  it  does  not  by  any  means  follow 
either  that  the  things  of  the  belly  must  always  be 
Society's  main  concern,  or  that  they  will  always 
continue  to  dominate  and  determine  the  other 
forms  of  social  action.  Far  from  it.  The  present 
dominance  of  economic  considerations  in  Society  is 
based  on  two  things — the  "struggle  for  bread" 
and  the  "struggle  for  power."  In  the  struggle  for 

1  See  The  Servile  State,  by  Hilaire  Belloc,  and  The  Real  De- 
mocracy, by  J.  E.  F.  Mann,  N.  J.  Sievers,  and  R.  W.  T.  Cox. 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    153 

bread  there  are  two  factors — shortage  and  maldis- 
tribution— to  be  considered.  In  so  far  as  pro- 
ductive power  falls  short,  and  there  is  a  real  de- 
ficiency in  the  supply  of  commodities  to  supply 
real  needs,  there  exists  an  economic  problem  which 
will  continue  to  trouble  us  whatever  social  system  we 
may  adopt,  until  we  find  a  remedy  in  increasing 
production.  But  in  so  far  as  productive  power 
is  adequate,  but  difficulty  arises  over  the  division 
of  the  product,  i.e.  maldistribution,  the  problem 
disappears  with  the  realization  of  economic  equality. 
And  with  the  disappearance  of  this  problem  goes 
also  one  of  the  two  causes  which  make  the  eco- 
nomic factors  dominate  the  other  factors  in  social 
organization. 

The  second  cause,  the  "struggle  for  power," 
remains.  This  is  not  exclusively  or  in  its  nature 
economic;  but  it  manifests  itself  in  the  economic 
sphere  in  a  struggle  between  economic  classes  for 
the  control  of  industry.  With  the  abolition  of 
economic  class,  and  the  establishment  of  unified 
functional  control  of  industries  by  all  the  persons 
engaged  in  them,  the  social  struggle  for  economic 
power  also  disappears,  and  the  second  cause  of  the 
predominance  of  economic  factors  is  also  removed. 
In  other  words,  democratic  functional  organization 
and  approximate  economic  equality  are  the  condi- 
tions of  the  removal  of  the  dominance  of  economic 
factors  in  Society. 

In  short,  if  economic  classes  and  class-conflicts 
are  done  away  with,  the  Marxian  thesis  will  no 
longer  hold  good,  and  economic  power  will  no  longer 
be  the  dominant  factor  in  Society.  Economic  con- 


154-  SOCIAL  THEORY 

siderations  will  lose  their  unreal  and  distorted  mag- 
nitude in  men's  eyes,  and  will  retain  their  place  as 
one  group  among  others  round  which  the  necessary 
social  functions  are  centered.  For  the  artificial  ma- 
terial valuation  of  social  things,  which  is  forced  upon 
us  by  the  actual  structure  of  present-day  Society,  it 
will  become  possible  to  substitute  a  spiritual  valua- 
tion. When  once  we  have  got  the  economic  sphere 
of  social  action  reasonably  organized  on  functional 
lines,  we  shall  be  free  to  forget  about  it  most  of  the 
time,  and  to  interest  ourselves  in  other  matters. 
The  economic  sphere  will  not,  of  course,  be  any  less 
essential  than  before ;  but  it  will  need  less  attention. 
Always  associations  and  institutions,  as  well  as 
people,  need  most  attention  when  they  are  least 
"themselves."  Our  preoccupation  with  econom- 
ics occurs  only  because  the  economic  system  is 
diseased. 

Needless  to  say,  the  organization  of  the  "eco- 
nomic substratum"  of  Society  on  functional  lines 
would  produce  a  very  different  economic  organiza- 
tion from  that  which  exists  in  Society  at  the  present 
time.  To-day,  almost  all  the  economic  forms  of  as- 
sociation are  doubled  with  counter-association  of 
workers  responding  to  association  of  employers, 
often  with  associations  of  managers  and  profession- 
als trying  to  steer  an  awkward  course  between  these 
persistent  Symplegades.  All  this  duplication  of  asso- 
ciations is  not  merely  wasteful,  but  actively  perni- 
cious. It  means  that  energy,  which  is  required  for 
the  service  of  the  community,  is  diverted  and  per- 
verted into  a  conflict  which,  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  community,  produces  nothing. 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    155 

This  it  not  to  condemn  those  who  engage  in,  or 
actively  stir  up,  such  conflict.  The  class-divisions 
and  economic  inequalities  which  exist  in  Society 
make  the  conflict  not  merely  inevitable,  but  the  only 
means  to  the  attainment  of  better  conditions.  It 
has  been  truly  said  that  there  is  no  instance  in  his- 
tory of  a  dominant  economic  class  giving  up 
its  position  except  under  the  pressure  of  a  rising 
economic  class  which  has  become  stronger  than 
itself.  The  only  end  to  this  process  is  the  abolition 
of  economic  classes  and  the  realization  of  economic 
equality. 

The  economic  structure  of  Society  can  only  be 
properly  adjusted  to  the  due  performance  of  its 
function  when  the  elements  of  conflict,  and  with 
them  the  conflicting  forms  of  economic  association, 
are  resolved  into  a  functional  unity.  This  would  in- 
volve the  disappearance  of  some,  and  the  radical 
reorganization  and  re-orientation  of  others,  of  the 
existing  types  of  economic  association.  The  em- 
ployers' association  and  the  Trade  Union  would 
alike  be  out  of  place  as  primarily  offensive  and 
defensive  forms  of  organization,  and  the  main  types 
of  association  would  find  their  motive  not  in  defense 
or  offense,  but  in  social  service.  The  personnel  of 
industry  would  no  longer  be  divided  into  opposing 
camps,  but  united  in  its  common  pursuit  of  its  func- 
tion of  the  social  organization  of  production. 

If  this  chapter  seems  altogether  too  general  and 
unsubstantial  to  be  a  real  analysis  or  criticism  of 
the  economic  part  of  the  social  structure,  that  is 
because  I  am  loth,  by  plunging  into  details  of  pres- 


156  SOCIAL  THEORY 

ent-day  organization,  to  overweight  this  book  with 
controversies  which  are  irrelevant  to  its  central 
purpose.  I  am  trying  to  speak  in  general  terms, 
leaving  the  application  to  be  made,  and  the  moral 
to  be  pointed,  by  others  or  in  other  bodies.  I  have 
tHerefore  not  attempted  to  describe  the  present  or 
past  or  future  economic  organization  of  Society,  but 
only  to  point  out  where  economic  conditions  and 
organization  do,  and  do  not,  affect  the  structure  and 
working  of  Society  as  a  whole.  Ordinary  "political 
theory"  has  suffered  immeasurably  from  its  ignoring 
of  the  economic  aspects  and  structure  of  the  social 
system,  while  Marxian  theory  suffers  from  its 
persistent  identification  of  the  economic  structure 
with  Society  as  a  whole.  I  have  tried  to  avoid  both 
these  mistakes,  and  at  the  same  time  to  recognize 
the  vast  influence  which  economic  conditions  must 
always  have  upon  the  character  of  social  organiza- 
tion as  a  whole,  and  to  point  out  wherein  it  seems  to 
me  this  influence  would  be  limited  and  made  definite 
under  a  system  of  economic  equality. 

There  are  economic  arguments  and  moral  argu- 
ments enough  in  favor  of  the  adoption  of  the  prin- 
ciple of  equality  in  the  economic  sphere.  With  these 
arguments  I  am  not  here  concerned.  I  have  tried 
only  to  start  the  argument  for  economic  equality 
from  the  standpoint  of  social  theory  and  social  or- 
ganization. In  conclusion,  let  me  restate  this  argu- 
ment in  a  single  sentence. 

The  existence  of  economic  inequality  means  that 
each  form  of  association  in  Society,  instead  of  at- 
tending to  the  fulfillment  of  its  own  social  func- 
tion, is  perverted  to  serve  economic  ends,  and 


ECONOMIC  STRUCTURE  OF  SOCIETY    157 

that  thereby  the  whole  balance  and  coherence  of 
Society  are  destroyed,  and,  in  the  last  resort,  revo- 
lution is  converted  from  a  menace  into  a 
necessity  for  the  restoration  of  a  reasonable  social 
system. 


CHAPTER  X 

REGIONALISM  AND  LOCAL  GOVERNMENT 

IN  our  treatment  of  the  State  in  earlier  chap- 
ters, we  explicitly  reserved  for  later  consideration 
the  question  of  local  government.  One  good 
reason  for  adopting  this  course  was  that  the  question 
of  local  organization  arises  not  only  in  relation  to 
the  political  structure  of  Society,  but  also  in  relation 
to  its  economic  structure  and  to  the  structure  of 
every  functional  form  of  association.  For  us,  the 
problem  of  local  government  is  not  merely  a  problem 
of  the  relations  between  the  State  and  the  "local 
authorities,"  but  of  the  whole  organization  of 
Society  over  larger  and  smaller  geographical 
areas. 

It  is  being  realized  to  an  increasing  extent  that 
the  problem  of  the  areas  of  government  and 
administration  is  not  a  purely  political  question, 
but  also  raises  at  once  many  economic  issues.  Thus, 
it  is  often  made  a  cause  of  complaint  against  the 
existing  areas  of  local  government  that  they  do  not 
correspond  to  economic  requirements.  An  efficient 
tramway  service  needs  to  serve  the  areas  of  several 
neighboring  towns  as  well  as  the  rural  districts 
between  them ;  the  supply  of  water  and  other  public 
utility  services  could  be  better  administered  if  the 

158 


REGIONALISM  159 

areas  of  local  government  were  enlarged;  what 
has  grown  to  be  essentially  a  single  city  is  often 
divided  into  several  boroughs  with  their  separate 
administrations;  a  town  or  city  is  constantly  faced 
with  the  overflow  of  its  suburbs  into  the  areas  of 
surrounding  authorities.  Similarly,  in  the  purely 
economic  sphere,  we  have  schemes  for  the  regional- 
ization  of  the  coal-mining  industry  under  big 
regional  trusts.1 

These  are  only  a  few  instances  of  the  insistence 
with  which  the  problem  of  areas  is  forcing  itself 
upon  our  consideration  at  the  present  time.  Here, 
we  are  not  concerned  directly  with  the  solution  of 
these  particular  difficulties,  but  with  the  general 
problem  of  the  areas  of  functional  administration, 
and  the  relations  of  larger  and  smaller  areas  within  a 
given  Society.  Clearly,  the  tendency  at  the  present 
time  is  for  the  areas  of  administration  to  enlarge 
themselves  continually  in  response  to  the  growth  in 
the  scale  of  production  and  to  the  continual  ex- 
pansion and  "running  into  one  another"  of  the 
growing  towns  and  urban  areas. 

The  case  for  the  preservation  of  small  areas  and 
units  of  government  has  been  again  and  again 
clearly  and  forcibly  stated.  It  has  been  pointed  out 
that,  as  areas  grow  larger,  the  direct  contact  between 
the  representative  and  the  represented  tends  to  dis- 
appear, and  the  unreality  of  representation  grows 
greater  and  more  evident.  Rousseau  held  that 

1  For  the  economic  difficulties  involved  in  existing  areas  of 
local  government,  see  State  and  Municipal  Enterprise,  by  S. 
and  B.  Webb  (Labor  Research  Department)  ;  and  for  re- 
gionalization  of  coal  mines,  see  Sir  A.  Duckham's  scheme  in 
the  Reports  of  the  Coal  Industry  Commission. 


160  SOCIAL  THEORY 

democracy  as  only  possible  in  small  Societies, 
because  only  in  small  Societies  could  the  people  as 
a  whole  retain  its  control  over  the  conduct  of  affairs. 
Mr.  Penty  and  the  craftsmen,  Mr.  Chesterton  in 
The  Napoleon  of  Notting  Hill,  and  other  and  graver 
authorities,  have  put  the  case  for  the  small  unit  as 
the  human  unit  which  makes  possible  a  spirit  of 
neighborhood  and  unity  which  is  difficult  to  attain 
over  larger  areas.  The  followers  of  Professor 
Patrick  Geddes  have  infused  into  their  conception 
of  "Town-Planning"  the  love  of  the  small  area.  It 
is,  I  think,  true  that,  in  the  long  run  at  least,  to  allow 
"local  patriotism"  and  local  organization  to  fall 
into  decay  and  disrepute  is  to  imperil  the  whole 
basis  on  which  Society  rests. 

It  is  a  commonplace  at  the  present  time  that  local 
feeling  is  in  decay.  Indeed,  the  constant  attempts 
to  discover  "revivals"  of  it  and  to  stimulate  it 
into  action  serve  to  show  how  serious  the  decay  is. 
Even  where  local  feeling  remains  strong  and  vigor- 
ous, as  in  many  parts  of  Great  Britain  it  does,  it  has, 
nevertheless  withdrawn  itself  largely  from  the 
sphere  of  local  government,  or  local  economic 
administration,  and  concentrated  itself  round  the 
less  organized  and  unorganized  parts  of  local  life — 
sport,  for  instance,  and  sociability  in  general.  This 
is  a  perilous  situation  for  the  community;  for, 
under  right  conditions,  local  feeling  ought  to  express 
itself  not  only  in  these  largely  personal  spheres, 
but  also  in  all  the  spheres  of  organized  social 
administration. 

Regionalism,  as  I  understand  it,  is  primarily  an 
attempt  to  face  this  difficulty,  and  by  making  local 


REGIONALISM  161 

areas  real  areas,  to  restore  the  influence  of  local 
spirit  upon  the  work  of  social  administration.  It  is 
an  attempt  to  define  areas  which  are  at  once  units 
of  social  feeling  and,  as  far  as  possible,  also  areas  of 
economic  life,  and  suitable  to  serve  as  units  for  the 
work  of  administration.  The  chief  faults  of  most 
of  the  existing  areas  are  two:  their  unreality  as 
centers  of  local  feelings,  and  their  inadequacy  to  the 
work  of  administration  under  modern  conditions, 
in  relation  not  only  to  local  transport  and  other 
public  utility  services,  but  also  to  public  health, 
education,  and  most  of  the  other  work  of  local 
government. 

If  these  two  faults  admit  of  a  single  remedy,  so 
much  the  better;  and  clearly  the  views  of  the 
regionalists  and  of  those  who  think  with  them  in 
this  matter  have  every  claim  to  be  fully  considered 
by  a  Society  which  is  admittedly  sick  and  ill  at 
ease  with  its  existing  areas. 

But  what  must  strike  us  at  once  is  the  fact  that 
the  regionalist  proposal  may  appear  in  two  contrary 
lights.  From  one  point  of  view,  it  appears  as  a 
proposal  for  the  drastic  enlargement  of  the  present 
areas  of  local  administration,  while  from  another 
point  of  view  it  appears  as  a  scheme  of  devolution, 
or  more,  designed  to  reduce  the  area  of  administra- 
tion in  respect  of  many  of  those  matters  which  are 
now  dealt  with  centrally  by  the  State. 

Thus,  we  see  that  we  cannot  treat  the  problem  of 
areas  in  isolation  from  the  content  of  their  admin- 
istration— from  their  powers  and  the  questions  with 
which  they  are  concerned.  Under  the  existing,  and 
indeed  under  any  system,  some  things  will  be 


162  SOCIAL  THEORY 

administered  centrally  and  some  locally.  This  would 
be  the  case  also  if  "regions"  were  adopted  as 
important  units  of  administration.  The  problem 
is  thus  complex,  and  involves  a  combined  considera- 
tion of  areas  and  powers. 

Before  we  consider  this  problem  directly,  it  is 
necessary  to  point  out  that  the  whole  question  as- 
sumes rather  a  different  form  in  a  functionally 
organized  Society  from  that  which  it  has  under  the 
existing  conditions  of  local  and  central  government. 
For  the  objection  that  the  representative  loses 
touch  with,  and  cannot  be  controlled  by,  those 
whom  he  represents  in  a  large  area,  though  it  still 
has  force,  is  far  less  applicable  when  the  function 
of  the  representative  is  clearly  defined  than  where 
it  is  vague  or  general.  A  functionally  organized 
Society  can  therefore  maintain  its  democratic 
character  over  a  larger  area  than  a  Society  organized 
on  the  pattern  of  State  Sovereignty,  or,  for  that 
matter,  than  a  Society  organized  on  the  basis  of 
Marxian  industrialism.  If  it  is  inconvenient  to 
restrict  the  size  of  an  area,  it  may  be  possible  to 
preserve  democracy  by  restricting  the  function,  and 
at  the  same  time  increasing  the  number  of  repre- 
sentative bodies  in  the  larger  area. 

Thus,  while  it  might  be  dangerous  to  enlarge  the 
areas  of  local  government  in  industry  and  politics 
under  existing  conditions,  I  believe  that  the  "region" 
would  be,  for  many  of  the  most  important  purposes, 
the  best  area  of  local  government  in  a  functionally 
organized  Society.  The  unit  of  local  government, 
to  be  effective,  must  be  at  once  small  enough  to  be 
democratically  controlled,  and  a  real  unit  of  social 


REGIONALISM  163 

life  and  feeling.  An  area  which  would  be  too  large 
under  a  non- functional  system  might  be  just  the 
right  size  for  democratic  and  efficient  functional 
administration. 

But  what  of  Regionalism  as  a  proposal  to  sub- 
stitute, for  many  purposes,  the  smaller  area  of  the 
"region"  for  the  larger  area  of  the  State  or  the 
national  economic  organization?  I  believe  that 
this  proposal  is  largely  right  because,  in  most  cases, 
the  area  x  of  the  present-day  States  is  simply  too 
large  for  effective  or  democratic  organization  of 
most  things  under  any  system,  however  functional. 
This  does  not  mean  that  the  present  State  areas 
have  no  reality  and  no  use;  but  only  that  many 
matters  which  are  now  administered  naturally 
would  be  better  administered  over  a  smaller  area. 
The  larger  areas — those  which  are  larger  than  the 
"region"  or  "province" — seem  to  be  marked  out 
as  spheres  rather  of  coordinating  activity  on  most 
questions  than  of  actual  executive  direction. 

If,  as  I  believe,  both  economic  life  and  social  life 
generally  call  for  "regional"  organization  and  for 
the  centering  in  the  region  of  the  largest  measure  of 
actual  executive  authority,  two  groups  of  questions 
at  once  arise.  First,  what  is  the  proper  relation 
of  the  economic  or  political  "region"  to  the  larger 
groups  of  which  it  forms  a  part,  and  to  the  smaller 
groups  which  form  part  of  it?  And  secondly,  is 
there  any  principle  which  can  serve  as  at  least  a 

1  Here  and  elsewhere  I  use  the  word  "area,"  not  to  denote  so 
many  square  miles,  but  a  complex  involving  various  considera- 
tions, including  the  extent,  population,  economic  and  general 
character  of  the  country,  psychology  of  the  inhabitants,  etc. 


164  SOCIAL  THEORY 

general  indication  of  the  respective  spheres  of  the 
various  "sizes"  of  administrative  or  governmental 
unit? 

The  first  group  of  questions  at  once  raises  the 
problem  of  federalism,  decentralization,  or  some 
other  form  of  allocation  of  powers.  Broadly 
speaking,  there  are  in  operation  in  different  places 
three  different  systems,  in  addition  to  all  manner  of 
variations  upon  them,  of  determining  the  relations 
between  larger  and  smaller  authorities  of  the  same 
type  within  a  single  Society.  First,  there  is  feder- 
alism in  the  strict  sense,  under  which  all  authority 
is  finally  vested  in  the  smaller  bodies  severally,  and 
each  of  these  hands  over  certain  definite  powers  to 
the  larger  body,  retaining  in  its  own  hands  all 
powers  not  specifically  transferred.  Secondly,  there 
is  decentralisation  or  centralisation,  in  which  all 
power  is  credited  originally  to  the  larger  body,  which 
doles  out  with  greater  or  less  generosity  such  powers 
as  it  thinks  fit  to  the  smaller  bodies.  English  local 
government,  in  so  far  as  it  rests  upon  statute  law, 
belongs  to  this  type.  Thirdly,  there  is  the  form  in 
which  the  power  is  originally  divided  between  the 
larger  and  the  smaller  bodies,  special  powers  being 
reserved  to  each.  This  occurs  principally  in  the 
case  of  written  constitutions,  and  especially  under 
systems  of  Dominion  Home  Rule  in  the  British 
Empire.  Such  intermediate  systems  are  generally 
worded  either  in  federal  terms  (as  in  the  case  of 
Australia)  or  in  unitary  terms  (as  in  the  case  of 
Canada)  ;  but  the  wording  makes  little  difference  to 
the  result.  Such  mixed  systems  really  constitute  a 
third  type. 


REGIONALISM  165 

In  the  sphere  of  political  government,  in  which 
alone  there  is  evidence  enough  to  go  upon,  both 
constitutions  originally  federal  and  constitutions 
originally  unitary  tend  to  approximate  as  the  result 
of  experience  of  present-day  conditions  to  this 
third,  or  mixed,  type.  The  reason  is  obvious.  The 
relation  between  larger  and  smaller  bodies  of  the 
same  kind  is  increasingly  denning  itself  in  terms  not 
of  powers  alone,  but  of  powers  in  relation  to  func- 
tions. It  is  for  the  larger  body  to  fulfill  certain 
functions,  and  for  the  smaller  bodies  to  fulfill  certain 
others.  The  question  of  local  and  central  government 
is  not,  in  fact,  primarily  a  question  between  federal- 
ism and  decentralization,  but  a  question  of  a  right 
allocation  of  social  functions. 

This  is  true  as  regards  the  ends  to  be  attained 
and  the  actual  balance  to  be  sought;  but  it  is  not 
true  to  the  same  extent  of  the  methods  to  be  used. 
The  methods  are,  in  fact,  prescribed  by  the  cir- 
cumstances. If  there  exists  a  large  "unitarily" 
administered  area  which  requires  to  be  broken  up 
for  the  performance  of  some  of  its  functions,  the 
method  of  decentralization  will  normally  be  the  most 
convenient  method  both  of  breaking  it  up  and  of  set- 
ting up  new  "regional"  bodies  where  they  are  re- 
quired. If,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  desired  to  bind 
together  a  number  of  uncoordinated  small  bodies 
into  a  larger  unit,  federation  is  often  the  easiest  in- 
strument to  use,  at  least  in  the  earlier  stages.  The 
method  is  a  matter  of  temporary  expediency,  and 
differing  methods  are  needed  in  different  circum- 
stances for  arriving  at  the  same  end. 

Not  so  with  the  end  itself.    Before  we  can  begin 


166  SOCIAL  THEORY 

to  think  about  methods,  we  must  know,  as  something 
comparatively  fixed  and  definite,  the  end  to  which 
we  desire  to  attain.  We  must  make  up  our  minds 
what,  for  our  Society  and  generation,  is  the  most 
desirable  division  of  functions  between  larger  and 
smaller  bodies  within  it,  and  we  must  then  discover 
the  methods  best  suited  to  promote  the  realization 
of  this  object. 

I  believe  that,  in  a  functionally  organized  Society, 
the  great  bulk  of  the  administrative  work,  both 
politically  and  economically,  will  best  be  done 
"regionally,"  that  is  by  political  and  economic 
bodies  intermediate  in  extent  between  the  national 
State  and  the  existing  local  authorities.1  Were 
some  such  principle  adopted,  and  twenty  or  thirty 
such  areas  brought  into  administrative  existence  in 
England,  I  believe  that  the  functions  which  would 
still  be  best  executed  by  the  big  natural  unit  would 
be  chiefly  functions  of  coordination,  apart  from  a 
few  big  groups  of  questions,  both  economic  and 
political,  in  which  national  uniformity  of  treatment 
would  continue  to  be  essential. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  I  am  speaking  here 
not  of  a  single  national  body,  the  State,  and  of  a 
single  local  or  rather  "regional"  body  in  each 
"region,"  but  of  a  number  of  national  functional 

1  The  "region,"  in  the  sense  in  which  I  use  the  word,  is  not 
so  large  as  the  "province"  contemplated  in  most  schemes  of 
English  "Provincial  Home  Rule,"  or  in  plans  for  a  "New 
Heptarchy" ;  but  it  is  considerably  larger  than  most  of  the  ex- 
isting areas  of  local  government.  I  believe  England  could 
reasonably  be  divided  into,  say,  twenty  or  thirty  regions,  most 
of  which  would  be  real  social  units  and  local  feeling,  and 
many  of  which  would  be  also  approximately  economic  units. 


REGIONALISM  167 

bodies  in  the  national  area,  and  of  a  number  of 
regional  functional  bodies  in  the  "region."  The 
problem  has  its  different  aspects — that  of  co- 
ordinating the  working  of  regional  economic  bodies 
on  the  one  hand,  and  that  of  coordinating  regional 
political  bodies  on  the  other.  The  problem  of 
coordinating  political  with  economic  bodies  we 
have  already  discussed,  and  our  treatment  of  that 
subject  in  Chapter  VIII.  holds  good  of  the  "region" 
as  well  as  of  the  national  area. 

If  coordination  is  to  be  the  main  function  of  the 
national  bodies,  what  is  the  best  method  of  repre- 
sentation upon  them?  There  seem  to  Se,  broadly 
speaking,  two  possibilities — one,  the  method  now 
adopted  for  electing  Parliaments  and  many  other 
national  bodies,  by  universal  suffrage  in  geographi- 
cal constituencies  with  or  without  Proportional  Rep- 
resentation, or  various  other  devices  for  making 
representation  more  true  or  the  reverse — the  other, 
the  method  of  indirect  electing,  under  which  the 
members  of  the  national  bodies  are  chosen  by  the 
bodies  of  the  same  kind  covering  a  smaller  area, 
the  members  of  a  national  assembly  by  the  various 
regional  assemblies  of  the  same  kind  for  example. 
Where  the  main  duty  of  a  national  body  is  that  of 
coordination  within  a  clearly  defined  sphere,  I  am 
inclined  to  believe  that  the  second  method  will  be 
found  to  be  the  best.  Under  a  regional  system,  the 
direct  control  of  the  elector  would  be  over  his  repre- 
sentatives on  the  various  functional  bodies  within  the 
"region,"  and  it  would  be  best  for  these  in  turn  to 
control,  and  where  necessary  recall,  their  representa- 
tives on  the  various  national  coordinating  bodies. 


168  SOCIAL  THEORY 

I  do  not,  however,  desire  to  suggest  that  this 
indirect  form  of  election  would  necessarily  apply 
to  every  national  body.  The  method  of  election 
that  is  best  varies  with  the  function  of  the  body 
concerned,  and,  if  a  national  body  exercises  large 
powers  of  direct  administration  or  government,  or 
deals  with  matters  for  which  there  is  no  corre- 
sponding regional  body,  direct  election  is  obviously 
available  as  an  alternative. 

It  will  be  seen  that,  in  local  as  in  national  affairs, 
the  arguments  advanced  in  this  book  favor  the  ad 
hoc  principle.  Indeed,  they  favor  it  in  two  ways, 
by  insisting  on  the  need  for  a  clear  definition  of 
the  function  of  each  representative  body,  which 
is  the  distinguishing  mark  of  an  ad  hoc  authority, 
and  also  by  insisting  on  an  ad  hoc  electorate,  so  that 
everybody  votes  for  a  body  in  which  all  are  directly 
concerned,  but  vocational  and  other  special  or 
selective  electorates  are  adopted  in  other  cases. 
Provided  the  functions  of  the  body  are  clearly  de- 
fined, and  the  right  electorate  secured,  all  the  advan- 
tages lie  with  the  ad  hoc  body  over  the  omnibus  au- 
thority, which  is  based  upon  the  fallacious  theory  of 
representation  which  we  have  already  discarded. 

I  have  laid  stress  on  the  importance  of  the 
"region"  as  an  administrative  and  governmental 
area  for  political  and  economic  purposes  alike.  I 
do  not  mean  by  this  to  imply  that  it  is  always 
necessary,  or  possible,  to  adopt  exactly  the  same 
area  as  the  unit  for  all  the  various  social  functions. 
Thus,  in  a  particular  part  of  a  country,  the  limit  of 
social  feeling  may  be  so  clearly  marked  as  to  leave 
no  possible  doubt  as  to  the  proper  boundaries  for 


REGIONALISM  169 

a  particular  political  "region."  But,  while  this  is 
so,  it  may  be  quite  clear  that  this  political  "region" 
will  not  do  for  an  economic  "region,"  and  the 
economic  boundaries  may  be  no  less  distinctly,  but 
at  the  same  time  differently,  defined.  In  such  a 
case,  it  will  be  necessary  to  adopt  different  areas  for 
the  political  and  the  economic  region.  It  is,  how- 
ever, desirable  that  the  areas  of  administration 
for  the  various  functions  should  coincide  wherever 
possible,  in  order  to  make  easy  cooperation  between 
the  various  functional  bodies  within  a  district.  The 
areas  ought  to  coincide  wherever  possible,  and, 
where  they  differ,  ought  to  overlap  as  little  as  pos- 
sible. Thus,  where  they  cannot  be  made  to  coincide, 
it  may  be  possible  to  make  the  area  of  two  "regions" 
dealing  with  one  function  coincide  with  the  area  of 
one  "region"  dealing  with  another. 

I  cannot  close  this  chapter  without  asserting,  with 
all  the  vehemence  at  my  command,  the  vital  im- 
portance to  the  larger  community  of  the  mainte- 
nance of  strong  local  life  and  feeling  throughout  the 
smaller  communities  within  it.  Only  if  men  can 
learn  the  social  spirit  in  their  daily  contact  with 
their  neighbors  can  they  hope  to  be  good  citizens 
of  the  larger  community.  Cooperation  begins  at 
home,  and  the  fact  that  we  often  quarrel  most 
fiercely  with  our  nearest  friends  and  neighbors  is 
only  a  further  indication  of  this  truth.  For  hate, 
like  love,  is  a  thing  of  the  emotions,  and  it  is  upon 
the  emotions  that  the  possibility  of  real  human  co- 
operation is  based.  The  local  spirit  of  a  commu- 
nity is  the  key  to  its  national  spirit. 

The  existing  local  bodies  mostly  fall  between  two 


170  SOCIAL  THEORY 

stools.  They  are  neither  small  enough  to  appeal  to 
the  spirit  of  "neighborliness"  nor  large  enough  to 
form  effective  units  of  political  or  economic  admin- 
istrations, or  to  appeal  to  that  larger  local  spirit 
which  characterizes  the  man  of  the  West  Country, 
or  the  Lancastrian,  or  the  Yorkshireman.1  The 
"region"  will  be  large  enough  to  be  efficient  and  to 
make  this  larger  appeal.  But  the  smaller  appeal 
will  still  need  to  be  made,  and  I  believe  that  the 
adoption  of  regional  areas  would  open  the  way  for  a 
revival  of  very  much  smaller  local  areas  which, 
without  possessing  important  administrative  func- 
tions, would  act  as  centers  round  which  the  feelings 
of  "neighborliness"  could  find  expression,  and  also 
as  most  valuable  organs  of  criticism  through  which 
a  fire  of  praise,  blame  and  advice  could  be  brought 
to  bear  upon  the  representatives  on  the  regional 
bodies.  Such  smaller  centers  of  feeling  and  expres- 
sion are  no  less  vital  to  real  democracy  than  the 
larger  bodies  upon  which,  under  present  conditions, 
most  of  the  work  of  administration  is  bound  to 
fall. 

It  should  be  noted  that,  throughout  this  chapter, 
the  treatment  of  the  question  of  "regionalism"  is 
theoretical  and  is  not  conceived  in  terms  of  prac- 
tical proposals  for  immediate  adoption.  I  am 
speaking,  not  of  changes  which  can  readily  be 
introduced  into  Society  as  it  is  at  present  con- 
stituted, but  of  the  form  which  local  government 
might  reasonably  be  expected  to  assume  in  a 
functionally  organized  Society.  At  present,  Society 

1  The  County  Council  is  not  a  unit,  but  a  residuum  with  the 
heart  cut  out  of  it  by  the  severance  of  the  towns. 


REGIONALISM  171 

is  largely  a  battle-ground  of  opposing  social  forces, 
especially  in  the  economic  sphere.  This  fact  in- 
evitably forces  upon  associations,  and  above  all  upon 
economic  associations,  a  growing  concentration 
upon  both  sides;  for  each  tries  to  roll  up  bigger 
battalions  with  which  to  confront  the  big  battalions 
of  its  adversary.  Thus,  both  capitalist  associations 
and  Trade  Unions  tend  to  an  increasing  extent  to 
centralize  their  activities  upon  at  least  a  national 
scale,  not  because  the  national  area  is  the  best  area 
for  most  forms  of  economic  administration,  but  be- 
cause they  are  less  concerned  with  efficient  service 
than  with  sectional  or  "class"  aims,  and  with  their 
mutual  struggle.  These  conditions,  making  for  cen- 
tralization, are  likely  to  persist  as  long  as  the  ex- 
isting diversion  of  the  community  into  opposing 
economic  classes  continues.  It  is  therefore  prob- 
able that  most  regionalist  proposals,  especially  in 
their  economic  aspects,  will  only  become  "practical 
politics"  when  the  existing  class-divisions  in  indus- 
try have  disappeared. 


CHAPTER  XI 

CHURCHES 

IT  is  impossible,  in  any  study  of  social  theory 
which  professes  to  be  in  any  sense  compre- 
hensive, not  to  deal  directly  with  the  place  of 
religious  associations  in  Society.  The  old  quarrel 
of  Church  and  State  may  belong  mainly  to  the  past, 
and  may  have  ceased,  in  this  country  at  least,  to 
affect  profoundly  the  whole  social  order;  but  the 
place  of  Churches  in  modern  Society  is  by  no  means 
settled,  and,  apart  from  this  controversy,  Churches 
occupy  a  position  of  essential  importance  in  the 
Society  of  to-day.  Not  only  is  the  Roman  Inter- 
national still  with  us:  the  Church  of  England  and 
the  "Free  Churches"  of  this  country  have  been  in 
our  own  day  centers  of  important  social  controversy, 
and,  as  we  saw  in  our  first  chapter,1  sources  from 
which  new  conceptions  of  the  functional  organiza- 
tion of  Society  have  flowed. 

In  the  past,  and  especially  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
the  controversy  between  Church  and  State  centered 
mainly  round  the  question  of  temporal  power — a 
controversy  dependent  upon  the  papal  claim  to  a 
vice-regency  of  God  over  all  the  Societies  of  Chris- 
tendom. To-day,  the  controversy  is  not  in  the  main 

*See  p.  10. 
172 


CHURCHES  173 

about  temporal  power,  but  about  the  relations 
which  should  exist  between  Church  and  State  in 
the  sphere  of  spiritual  power.  Thus,  the  Estab- 
lishment, regarded  by  its  adherents  as  a  recognition 
by  the  State  of  the  spiritual  mission  and  social 
function  of  the  Church,  is  in  fact  also  an  instrument 
of  State  supremacy  over  the  Church,  a  means  where- 
by the  temporal  power  of  the  State,  often  wielded 
now  by  persons  who  are  not  Churchmen,  takes  into 
its  hand  the  appointment  of  spiritual  leaders.  In 
return  for  a  doubtful  gain  in  status,  the  Established 
Church  surrenders  a  precious  part  of  its  autonomy 
— a  position  which  only  continues  because  the  Es- 
tablishment now  does  no  particular  harm  to  per- 
sons who  are  not  Churchmen,  while  Churchmen 
cling  to  it  either  from  a  sense  that  it  confers  or 
recognizes  status,  or  from  less  worthy  economic 
motives.  Thus,  the  growing  "Life  and  Liberty 
Movement"  in  the  Church  of  England  recognizes 
to  the  full  the  need  for  spiritual  autonomy,  but  still 
clings  to  Establishment,  which,  under  the  conditions 
of  to-day,  cannot  be  made  consistent  with  autonomy. 
In  so  far  as  "establishment"  is  to  be  regarded  as 
a  social  recognition  of  the  mission  of  the  "estab- 
lished" body,  it  appears  to  be  quite  logical  where, 
and  as  long  as,  the  vast  majority  of  the  people  owe 
allegiance  to  a  single  Church.  It  is  logical  in  such 
circumstances,  because  the  Church  cannot  concern 
itself  solely  with  purely  "private"  concerns,  but  must 
also,  if  it  is  to  have  a  mission  at  all,  concern  itself 
intimately  and  constantly  with  men's  social  and  as- 
sociative existence.  Its  rules  and  precepts  of  con- 
duct, if  they  apply  at  all,  must  apply  not  only  to 


174.  SOCIAL  THEORY 

men's  private  and  personal  doings,  but  also  to  their 
social  doings  and  to  the  doings  of  the  associations  of 
which  they  are  members.  No  Church  which  claims 
to  have  any  influence  upon  conduct  can  be  merely 
"other-worldly":  indeed,  it  can  only  be  effectively 
"other-worldly"  in  proportion  as  it  occupies  itself 
with  the  things  of  this  world. 

This  social  character  of  Churches,  implicit  in  their 
very  nature  and  explicit  wherever  they  have  any 
real  hold  upon  the  people,  carries  with  it  the  right 
to  the  recognition  of  Churches  as  an  integral  part  of 
the  structure  of  Society,  wherever  a  considerable 
proportion  of  the  people  is  concerned  with  them. 
But  "establishment"  has  so  far  meant  the  exclu- 
sive recognition  of  the  social  character  of  a  single 
Church  within  a  single  territory,  whether  or  not 
it  is  the  only  Church  or  the  Church  which  is  gener- 
ally accepted  by  the  people.  If,  however,  the  right 
to  recognition  depends  upon  the  social  character  of 
Churches,  that  right  extends  to  all  Churches  which 
possess  this  character.  The  functional  principle  im- 
plies the  recognition  of  all  Churches  on  a  basis  of 
equality. 

Here,  however,  an  immediate  difficulty  confronts 
us.  The  social  recognition  of  the  Miners'  Federa- 
tion or  of  the  Edinburgh  School  Board  does  not 
preclude  the  social  recognition  of  the  National 
Union  of  Railwaymen  or  the  School  Board  of 
Dundee.  Indeed,  it  even  implies  it;  for  the  func- 
tions of  various  industries  and  of  various  local  au- 
thorities are  complementary,  and  form  a  basis  for 
cooperation  and  the  creation  of  joint  and  federal 
bodies  where  they  are  required  for  the  functioning 


CHURCHES  175 

and  social  recognition  of  any  particular  form  of 
association.  Churches,  on  the  other  hand,  despite 
attempts  at  "Reunion  All  Round"  are  not  pro- 
fessedly complementary  and  do  not  naturally  co- 
here; for  almost  every  one  of  them  professes,  and 
must  be  taken  as  believing  itself,  to  be  the  only  true 
Church. 

The  problem  of  "recognition,"  then,  is  not  so 
simple  in  the  case  of  Churches  as  in  the  case  of  those 
forms  of  association  which  cohere  naturally,  because 
they  recognize  at  once  the  complementary  character 
of  their  social  functions. 

What,  then,  is  the  right  of  Churches  to  recogni- 
tion to  mean  in  practice  in  a  functionally  organized 
Society?  Or,  in  other  words,  what  is  the  right 
relation  of  Churches  in  such  a  Society  not  merely 
to  the  State,  but  to  the  various  essential  forms  of 
association  and  to  the  bodies  which  exist  to  coordi- 
nate their  work? 

We  cannot  hope  to  answer  this  question  until  we 
have  studied  more  carefully  the  nature  of  the  Church 
as  a  form  of  human  association.  As  soon  as  we  do 
this,  its  essential  difference  from  the  other  forms  of 
association  which  we  have  been  mainly  considering 
becomes  at  once  manifest.  The  "functions"  of 
which  we  have  been  speaking  throughout  this  book 
we  have  again  and  again  interpreted  as  meaning 
"getting  something  done,"  that  is,  producing  ma- 
terial results  external  to  the  persons  who  are  mem- 
bers of  the  associations.  I  do  not  mean  that 
Churches  never  aim  at  material  results,  any  more 
than  I  mean  that  political  and  economic  associa- 
tions have  no  spiritual  aspects,  or  aim  at  results 


176  SOCIAL  THEORY 

that  are  merely  material.  But  I  do  mean  that  the 
direct  objects  of  political  and  economic  association 
are  primarily  material,  whereas  the  direct  objects 
of  Churches  are  primarily  spiritual. 

This  fact  can  perhaps  be  stated  more  clearly  in 
another  way.  The  distinction  between  political  and 
economic  association  is  that  they  have  different  jobs 
to  do,  and  work  upon  different  subject-matters. 
But  Churches  must  concern  themselves  with  the 
subject-matter  of  both  political  and  economic  asso- 
ciations, as  well  as  with  many  matters  which  fall 
outside  their  sphere.  The  distinction  between 
Churches  and  these  other  forms  of  association  lies, 
then,  not  in  the  subject-matter  with  which  they 
deal,  but  in  their  different  ways  of  approaching  it. 
They  are  concerned  with  producing  a  material  re- 
sult, and  Churches  are  also  concerned  in  producing 
this  result;  but  with  political  and  economic  associa- 
tions the  result  is  primary,  while  with  Churches  it  is 
secondary  and  derivative.  The  primary  concern  of 
Churches,  as  social  associations,  is  to  make  their 
conception  of  the  Spirit  of  God  manifest  and  real 
upon  earth. 

The  appeal,  then,  of  Churches  is  different,  and  the 
form  of  social  power  proper  to  them  is  different. 
The  power  of  political  and  economic  associations  is 
a  material  power,  exercisable  in  the  last  resort  upon 
the  bodies  of  the  members :  the  power  of  Churches 
is  or  ought  to  be  a  spiritual  power,  exercisable  upon 
the  mind  and  not  upon  the  body. 

If  this  is  so,  it  follows  that  Churches  can  form  no 
part  of  the  coordinating  body  in  Society,  in  so  far 
as  this  body  is  concerned  with  material  forms  of 


CHURCHES  177 

coercion.  Material  coercion,  despite  the  rack  and 
the  stake,  is  no  business  of  Churches.  May  the  time 
come  when  it  will  cease  to  be  the  business  of  Society 
in  any  aspect. 

Our  problem  now  reappears  as  a  problem  of  the 
relation  of  spiritual  to  material  power.  And  we 
arrive  at  once  at  the  result  that  these  two  forms  of 
power  possess  no  organizable  relation.  If  there  is 
to  be  an  organized  relation  between  Churches  and 
the  other  forms  of  association  of  which  we  have 
been  speaking,  it  can  arise  only  in  two  cases,  where 
the  Churches  are  directly  concerned  with  material 
things  and  where  their  other  associations  are  di- 
rectly concerned  with  spiritual  things. 

In  fact,  the  proper  relation  of  Churches  to  politi- 
cal and  economic  forms  of  association  is  essentially 
one  of  cooperation  without  formal  coordination. 
Churches  cannot,  without  sacrificing  their  essentially 
spiritual  character,  enter  into,  or  become  a  part  of, 
the  coordinating  structure  of  Society  dealt  with  in 
Chapter  VIII.  But  they  can,  on  many  issues,  fruit- 
fully cooperate  with  other  associations.  An  in- 
stance is  the  civil  recognition  of  religious  marriages 
which  exist  to-day.  Cooperation  is  essential:  co- 
ordination a  distortion  of  the  character  both  of 
Churches  and  of  the  bodies  with  which  the  coordi- 
nation is  made. 

This  separation  of  Church  and  State  is  in  no  sense 
either  an  isolation  of  the  Churches  or  a  derogation 
from  their  social  character.  It  is  not  an  isolation, 
because  the  need  for  full  cooperation  remains :  it  is 
not  a  derogation,  because  it  is  the  very  fact  that  the 
Church — any  real  Church — is  a  universitas  in  itself 


178  SOCIAL  THEORY 

that  makes  coordination  impossible.  Full  liberty  of 
religious  association  and  observance  is  therefore  not 
the  sole  necessity:  full  self-government  for  every 
Church  and  complete  freedom  from  interference 
with  its  management,  appointments,  doctrines  and 
spiritual  conduct  is  also  implied.  Only  through 
such  separation  can  Churches  be  freed  for  the  at- 
tainment of  the  fullest  liberty  and  the  proper  per- 
formance of  their  spiritual  function.  Political  and 
economic  associations  must  make  their  laws  and 
Churches  theirs.  They  may  differ  and  even  be  con- 
tradictory; but  they  cannot  conflict  because  they 
are  on  different  planes,  and,  where  they  are  con- 
tradictory, it  is  for  the  individual  to  choose  his 
allegiance.  History  proves  that  he  will  often  prefer 
a  material  penalty  to  a  spiritual  reprobation. 

Nothing  that  has  been  said  in  this  chapter  is 
meant  to  suggest  that  the  organized  Churches  pos- 
sess a  monopoly  of  the  spiritual  function,  or  that 
they  are  the  sole  depositories  of  spiritual  wisdom. 
As  in  other  spheres,  the  individual  is  the  ultimate 
depository  of  spiritual  wisdom  and  unwisdom,  and 
only  a  part  of  his  "wisdom"  is  susceptible  of  organi- 
zation. The  existence  of  Churches  is  only  one  of 
the  objective  symbols  of  the  truth  that  every  ma- 
terial thing  and  purpose  is  also  spiritual,  and  their 
separate  existence  does  not  derogate  from,  but 
serves  to  emphasize,  the  spiritual  as  well  as  material 
character  of  other  associations.  As  in  man,  so  in 
Society  and  in  the  community,  the  spiritual  and  ma- 
terial "universes"  exist  side  by  side,  related  in  a  re- 
lation which,  fundamental  and  necessary  as  it  is,  is 
no  easier  to  explain  in  the  one  case  than  in  the  other. 


CHURCHES  179 

Much  that  is  spiritual  escapes  the  organizing  influ- 
ence of  all  the  Churches,  as  much  that  is  material 
escapes  the  organizing  of  political,  economic  and 
other  primarily  material  forms  of  association ;  in  the 
spiritual,  as  in  every  other  sphere,  the  individual 
remains  as  the  ultimate  reality  in  which  all  associa- 
tion is  built,  but  whom  association  can  never  ex- 
haust or  completely  express. 


CHAPTER  XII 

LIBERTY 

THIS  book  has  throughout  dealt  mainly  with 
the  functions  and  interrelation  of  associations 
within  the  community,  with  the  nature  of  as- 
sociation, and  with  its  various  forms  and  motives, 
with  the  problems  arising  out  of  the  actual  work- 
ing of  associations,  and  so  on.    In  short,  it  has  been 
mainly  a  book  about  organized  Society,  and  has 
only  dealt  incidentally  and  in  passing  with  those 
aspects  of  community  which  fall  outside  the  sphere 
of  organized  Society. 

This,  however,  does  not  absolve  us  from  the  ne- 
cessity of  dealing,  from  our  own  standpoint,  with 
the  problem  which  has  presented  the  greatest  dif- 
ficulty of  all  to  every  social  theorist — the  problem  of 
the  relation  of  the  individual  to  Society,  and  of  the 
place  of  individual  liberty  in  the  community. 

The  problem  does  not,  indeed,  assume  for  us  the 
form  which  it  assumed  for  Herbert  Spencer,  the 
form  simply  expressed  in  the  phrase  "the  Man  ver- 
sus the  State" ;  but  neither  can  we  be  content  with 
P  the  simple  identification  of  liberty  with  law  to  which 
some  theorists  of  an  opposite  school  have  all  too 
willingly  approximated.  The  question  for  us  is  one, 

first,  of  the  relative  spheres  of  social  and  individual 
o 

180 


LIBERTY  181 

action,  and  secondly,  one  of  the  relation  of  the  in- 
dividual to  the  various  associations  of  which  he  is 
a  member,  or  which  claim  in  Society  a  jurisdiction 
which  affects  his  interests. 

This  forces  upon  us  some  attempt  to  define  liberty, 
as  it  appears  in  Society  and  in  the  community.  And 
here  the  first  thing  we  have  to  do  is  to  get  clear 
in  our  minds  a  distinction  between  two  senses  in 
which  the  word  is  used — liberty  attaching  to  the 
individual  qua  individual,  and  liberty  attaching  to 
associations  and  institutions  with  which  the  indi- 
vidual is  concerned.  This  is  not  the  familiar  dis- 
tinction between  "civil"  and  "political,"  or  even 
"social,"  liberty  as  it  is  ordinarily  drawn;  for  a 
liberty  attaching  to  the  individual  qua  individual 
may  be  political  or  economic  in  its  content  as  well  as 
civil.  It  is  a  distinction,  not  in  the  content  of  the 
liberty,  but  in  its  form  of  expression,  between  the 
liberty  of  personal  freedom  and  the  liberty  of  free 
•and  self-governing  association. 

It  has  often  been  pointed  out  that,  if  every  in- 
dividual is  left  absolutely  free  and  unrestricted,  the 
result,  taken  as  a  whole,  is  not  liberty  but  anarchy. 
Nominally  free,  in  such  circumstances,  the  individual 
has  really  no  freedom  because  he  has  no  security 
or  safeguard,  and  no  certainty  of  the  way  in  which 
other  people  will  behave  towards  him.  But  it  is 
no  less  true  that,  even  if  a  community  possesses  a 
complete  and  all-pervading  system  of  free  and  self- 
governing  association,  the  individual  is  not  neces- 
sarily any  more  free,  because  the  associations  may 
so  trammel  his  liberty  as  to  leave  him  no  range  for 
free  choice  or  personal  self-expression.  In  other 


182  SOCIAL  THEORY 

words,  "free"  institutions  do  not  necessarily  carry 
with  them  personal  liberty,  any  more  than  personal 
"unrestrainedness"  can  by  itself  secure  real  per- 
sonal freedom.  The  two  manifestations  of  liberty 
are  complementary,  and  neither  of  them  can  be 
complete,  or  even  real,  without  the  other. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  in  the  last  paragraph  there 
was  not  an  exact  parallel  between  our  two  cases. 
I  did  not  say  that,  whereas  personal  "unrestrained- 
ness"  could  not  guarantee  personal  freedom,  neither 
could  the  unrestrained  freedom  of  associations  guar- 
antee the  real  liberty  of  associations.  In  both  cases, 
the  end  in  view  was  the  liberty  of  the  individual; 
for,  in  the  last  resort,  the  word  "liberty"  has  no 
meaning  except  in  reference  to  the  individual.  We 
may  speak,  if  we  will,  of  a  "free  country"  or  a 
"free  Church" ;  but  in  both  cases  we  mean  a  freedom 
which  belongs  to  the  individuals  who  are  members 
of  the  body  or  community  concerned. 

Here  we  are  compelled  to  draw  a  further  distinc- 
tion. The  idea  of  liberty  directly  applying  to  the 
individual  qua  individual  is  a  simple  idea,  and  does 
mean  simply  "being  let  alone,"  with  only  the  quali- 
fication that  this  "being  let  alone"  is  an  abstrac- 
tion unless  and  until  it  is  brought  into  relation  to 
the  other  kind  of  liberty,  and  regarded  as  comple- 
mentary with  it.  But  the  idea  of  social  liberty,  or 
liberty  as  attaching  directly  to  associations,  is  a 
complex  idea,  and  includes  two  distinguishable  ele- 
ments. It  implies  first  the  freedom  of  the  associa- 
tion from  external  dictation  in  respect  of  its  manner 
of  performing  its  function,  and  it  implies  equally 
the  internal  self-government  and  democratic  char- 


LIBERTY  183 

acter  of  the  association  itself.  Thus,  when  we 
speak  of  a  "free  State,"  we  mean  both  a  State  which 
is  not  subject  to  any  other  State,  and  a  State  which 
is  democratically  governed.  Personal  liberty  is  thus 
simple  and  external;  social  liberty  dual,  and  both 
external  and  internal. 

This  difference  arises,  of  course,  from  the  fact 
that,  qua  individual,  the  individual  directly  trans- 
lates his  will  into  deed,  without  the  need  for  an  in- 
tervening organization,  whereas  the  individual  can 
only  act  socially  through  an  association  or  interme- 
diary, so  that  the  need  arises  for  a  second  type  of 
social  liberty,  the  equivalent  of  which  is  directly 
guaranteed  to  us  as  individuals  by  our  possession  of 
free  will.1 

Of  social  liberty,  or  the  liberty  of  associations,  it 
is  not  necessary  to  add  much  to  what  has  already 
been  said.  The  internal  liberty  of  associations  con- 
sists in  their  democratic  character,  and  in  the  truly 
representative  character  of  their  forms  of  govern- 
ment and  administration.  Their  external  liberty 
consists  in  their  freedom  from  interference  from 
outside  in  the  performance  of  their  functions.  The 
point  which  I  have  thus  emphasized  twice  by  the 
use  of  italics  is  of  the  first  importance.  The  exter- 
nal liberty  of  an  association  consists  not  in  its  free- 
dom from  all  interference  from  outside,  but  in  its 
freedom  in  relation  to  its  function.  Such  interfer- 
ence as  is  necessary  to  coordinate  its  function  with 

1  It  will,  of  course,  be  seen  that  I  am  here  refraining  from 
entering  into  the  oldest  ethical  controversy  in  the  world.  In 
such  an  ethical  theory  as  that  of  Kant,  personal  freedom  of 
course  has  its  internal  character  of  self-determination  as  well 
as  the  external  character  of  "unrestrainedness." 


184  SOCIAL  THEORY 

those  of  other  associations  is  not  a  diminution  of 
freedom,  and  interference  arising  from  a  departure 
by  the  association  from  its  function  is  still  less  so; 
for  the  association  exists  for  the  performance  of 
its  function  and  for  nothing  else,  and,  as  soon  as 
it  steps  outside  its  function,  its  rights  lapse  be- 
cause it  ceases  to  possess  to  its  members  a  true  rep- 
resentative relation.1 

Personal  liberty  also  is  so  simple  an  idea  in  itself 
as  to  need  no  detailed  separate  treatment.  It  is  sim- 
ply the  freedom  of  the  individual  to  express  with- 
out external  hindrance  his  "personality" — his  likes 
and  dislikes,  desires  and  aversions,  hopes  and  fears, 
his  sense  of  right  and  wrong,  beauty  and  ugliness, 
and  so  on. 

But  to  treat  these  two  forms  of  liberty  separately 
leads  us  nowhere.  They  acquire  a  real  meaning  only 
when  they  are  brought  into  relation  and  when  their 
complementary  character  is  fully  revealed.  Until 
that  is  done  they  remain  abstractions. 

Let  us  remember  above  all  that  liberty  as  a  whole 
has  a  meaning  only  in  relation  to  the  individual. 
Society  and  the  community  itself  have  no  meaning 
apart  from  the  individuals  composing  them,  and  to 
treat  them  as  "ends  in  themselves"  is  to  fall  into 
an  error  which  vitiates  every  conclusion  based  upon 
it.  When,  therefore,  we  seek  to  bring  personal  and 
social  liberty  into  a  complementary  relation,  what 
we  are  all  really  doing  is  to  seek  that  relation  be- 

1  This  statement  must  be  taken  in  connection  with  the  re- 
marks on  "perversion  of  function"  in  Chapter  III. ;  for  where 
perversion  in  one  case  causes  perversion  in  another  the  asso- 
ciation may  acquire  a  secondary  "counter-perversionary" 
function  which  upholds  its  representative  relation. 


LIBERTY  185 

tween  them  which  will  secure  the  greatest  liberty  for 
all  the  individuals  in  a  community,  both  severally 
and  in  association.  It  is  not  a  question  of  striking 
a  balance  between  the  claims  and  counter-claims  of 
the  individual  and  of  Society,  but  of  determining 
what  amount  of  organization  and  what  absence  of 
organization  will  secure  to  the  individual  the  great- 
est liberty  as  the  result  of  a  blending  of  personal 
and  social  liberties. 

First  of  all,  it  is  necessary  to  rid  ourselves  once 
and  for  all  of  the  notion  that  organization  is  in  itself 
a  good  thing.  It  is  very  easy  to  fall  into  the  notion 
that  growing  complexity  is  a  sign  of  progress,  and 
that  the  expanding  organization  of  Society  is  a  sign 
of  the  coming  of  the  Cooperative  Commonwealth. 
A  constantly  growing  measure  of  cooperation 
among  men  is  no  doubt  the  greatest  social  need  of 
our  day ;  but  cooperation  has  its  unorganized  as  well 
as  its  organized  forms,  and  certainly  the  unorgan- 
ized cooperation  of  men,  based  on  a  sheer  feeling  of 
community,  is  not  less  valuable  than  organized  co- 
operation, which  may  or  may  not  have  this  feeling  of 
community  behind  it.  It  is  easier  to  do  most  things 
with  organization  than  without ;  but  organization  is 
to  a  great  extent  only  the  scaffolding  without  which 
we  should  find  the  temple  of  human  cooperation  too 
difficult  to  build. 

To  say  this  is  not  to  decry  organization :  it  is  only 
to  refrain  from  worshiping  it.  Organization  is  a 
marvelous  instrument  through  which  we  every  day 
accomplish  all  manner  of  achievements  which  would 
be  inconceivable  without  it:  but  it  is  none  the  less 
better  to  do  a  thing  without  organization  if  we  can, 


186  SOCIAL  THEORY 

or  with  the  minimum  of  organization  that  is  neces- 
sary. For  all  organization,  as  we  have  seen,  neces- 
sarily carries  with  it  an  irreducible  minimum  of 
distortion  of  human  purpose :  it  always  comes  down, 
to  some  extent,  to  letting  other  people  do  things 
for  us  instead  of  doing  them  ourselves,  to  allow- 
ing, in  some  measures,  the  wills  of  "representatives" 
to  be  substituted  for  our  own  wills.  Thus  while  it 
makes  possible  in  one  way  a  vast  expansion  of  the 
field  of  self-expression  that  is  open  to  the  individual, 
it  also  in  another  way  distorts  that  expression 
and  makes  it  not  completely  the  individual's 
own. 

In  complex  modern  communities  there  are  so 
many  things  that  must  be  organized  that  it  becomes 
more  than  ever  important  to  preserve  from  organi- 
zation that  sphere  in  which  it  adds  least  to,  and  is 
apt  to  detract  most  from,  our  field  of  self-expres- 
sion— the  sphere  of  personal  relationships  and  per- 
sonal conduct.  Legislation  in  recent  times  has  tend- 
ed more  and  more  to  encroach  upon  this  sphere,  not 
so  much  directly  as  by  indirect  roads,  and  especially 
owing  to  the  operation  of  economic  causes.  Those 
measures  of  organization  and  social  coercion  which 
trench  upon  the  personal  liberty  of  the  individual 
or  of  the  family  are  almost  all  directly  traceable  to 
economic  causes,  and  fundamentally,  to  the  existence 
of  economic  inequality  in  the  community.  They 
are  the  repercussions  of  the  maldistribution  of 
property  and  income  upon  the  personal  lives  of  the 
poorer  sections  of  the  community.  Given  even  an 
approximate  economic  equality,  there  would  be  no 
need  for  them. 


LIBERTY  187 

This  is  a  sign  of  the  manner  in  which  bad  organi- 
zation, or  lack  of  free  organization  of  a  particular 
socfal  function,  at  once  causes  perversion  in  other 
spheres,  not  only  by  causing  one  association  to  usurp 
the  function  of  another,  but  by  causing  organization 
to  take  place,  and  compulsion  to  be  applied,  where 
personal  liberty  ought  most  to  be  preserved.  The  first 
necessity  for  concrete  liberty  for  the  individual  lies 
in  proper  free  functional  organization  of  those 
things  which  cannot  be  done  without  association. 
This  alone  makes  it  possible  to  leave  untouched 
those  spheres  of  human  action  which  are  spoiled 
by  organization. 

This  argument  can  be  stated  more  particularly 
in  another  way.  Economic  equality  is  essential  to 
personal  freedom  in  the  sphere  of  personal  and 
family  relations.  But  free,  or  democratic,  functional 
organization  in  the  economic  sphere  is  essential  to 
the  maintenance  of  economic  equality.  Therefore 
free  economic  organization  is  essential  to  personal 
liberty  in  the  sphere  of  personal  relations. 

But  the  individual  will  rightly  refuse  to  be  content 
with  a  personal  liberty  which  is  confined  to  the 
sphere  of  personal  relations.  Such  liberty  is  vital 
to  him ;  but  it  is  also  vital  to  him  to  be  personally 
free  in  his  associative  relations,  that  is,  in  relation 
to  the  associations  of  which  he  is  a  member,  or 
which  affect  him  by  their  operations.  In  relation  to 
the  associations  of  which  he  is  a  member,  he  will  de- 
mand social  freedom,  that  is,  a  right  to  a  full  share 
in  their  government  and  control.  But  this  will  not 
suffice  for  him.  In  addition  to  this  social  freedom 
which  he  and  his  fellows  will  claim  to  enjoy  in  rela- 


188  SOCIAL  THEORY 

tion  to  the  associations  to  which  they  belong,  each 
of  them  severally  will  claim  personal  liberty  in  the 
sense  of  freedom  from  being  tyrannized  over  even 
by  an  association  in  whose  decisions  he  has  a 
voice  and  vote.  What  safeguard  can  there  be 
for  personal  freedom  in  relation  to  associations, 
that  is,  what  safeguard  against  the  tyranny  of 
majorities? 

It  is  folly  to  attempt,  as  some  theorists  do,  to 
answer  this  argument  by  a  blank  denial  of  the  pos- 
sibility of  such  tyranny.  A  majority  can  be  just  as 
tyrannical  as  a  minority.  A  decision  does  not  be- 
come my  personal  decision  by  the  fact  that  it  is 
carried  against  my  vote  in  an  association  of  which 
I  am  a  member.  There  is  no  "paradox"  of  self- 
government  in  this  sense,  no  social  miracle  by  which 
my  will  can  be  transmuted  into  its  direct  opposite 
by  the  operation  of  democracy.  It  is  not  my  real 
will  to  carry  out  every  decision  of  a  majority  of  an 
association  to  which  I  happen  to  belong,  however 
silly  or  wrong  I  may  believe  it  to  be. 

In  most  forms  of  social  theory,  this  problem 
assumes  a  false  and  misleading  aspect  by  being  con- 
fined to  my  relations  to  one  particular  form  of 
association.  The  State  is  first  assumed  to  be  an  alto- 
gether superior  kind  of  association  or  super-asso- 
ciation, quite  different  from  all  the  other  associa- 
tions to  which  a  man  may  belong.  It  is  then 
assumed  that  he  stands  in  quite  a  different  relation 
to  the  State  from  his  relation  to  any  other  associa- 
tion. And,  whereas  no  one  in  his  senses  would 
believe  that  it  is  my  real  will  to  carry  out  all  the 
decisions  of  my  cricket  club,  without  questioning, 


LIBERTY  189 

men  can  be  brought  to  think  of  the  State  so  as 
to  say : 

"Theirs  not  to  reason  why: 
Theirs  but  to  do  and  die." 

If  our  analysis  of  the  nature  of  association  and 
our  account  of  the  nature  of  the  State  as  merely 
one  form  of  association  are  correct,  it  is  "theirs  to 
reason  why"  either  in  relation  to  all  associations 
or  to  none.  We  may  be  prepared  to  stretch  more 
points  in  favor  of  accepting  a  decision  of  the  State 
than  of  the  cricket  club,  because  we  regard  the 
maintenance  of  the  State  as  more  important;  but, 
if  we  reason  at  all,  we  must  apply  our  reason  to  the 
decrees  of  State  as  well  as  to  those  of  other  associa- 
tions. A  difference  of  degree  may  remain;  but  the 
difference  in  kind  has  disappeared. 

According,  therefore,  to  the  social  theory  ad- 
vanced in  this  book,  a  man  owes  not  one  absolute  so- 
cial loyalty  and  other  subordinate  loyalties  which 
must  always,  in  case  of  need,  be  overridden  by  it, 
but  a  number  of  relative  and  limited  loyalties,  of 
varying  importance  and  intensity,  but  not  essentially 
differing  in  kind.  If  this  is  so,  and  if  the  associa- 
tion to  which  we  owe  our  ultimate  loyalty  is  not 
externally  determined  for  us  by  the  character  of  the 
association  itself,  it  follows  that  the  choice  of  ulti- 
mate loyalty,  in  a  case  where  loyalties  conflict,  nec- 
essarily resides  in  the  individual  himself. 

It  is  true  that  the  functional  Society  which  we 
envisage  includes  in  its  structure  forms  of  co- 
ordination and,  in  the  last  resort,  coercion.  Thus, 
in  making  his  choice  of  loyalties,  the  individual  can- 


190  SOCIAL  THEORY 

not  choose  without  incurring  a  risk  of  penalty,  and 
does  not  escape  altogether  from  the  possibility  of 
being  coerced.  That,  however,  is  not  the  immedi- 
ate point  which  I  have  in  mind,  though  I  shall  be 
dealing  with  it  before  this  chapter  has  grown  much 
longer.  The  immediate  point  is  that  of  the  moral 
and  not  of  the  physical,  or  coercive,  obligation  upon 
the  individual,  and  a  great  moral  victory  is  won  for 
individual  liberty  by  the  successful  assertion  of  the 
individual's  ultimate  and  unassailable  moral  right 
to  choose  for  himself  among  conflicting  social  royal- 
ties. Even  if  Society  punishes  him  for  choosing 
in  a  manner  contrary  to  that  prescribed  by  its  co- 
ordinating organization,  it  has  no  right  to  blame 
him  or  call  him  "traitor"  merely  because  his  choice 
is  contrary  to  the  social  precept.  It  is  his  business 
how  he  cliooses,  even  if  the  consequences  are  still 
a  sphere  for  social  definition.1 

Moral  immunity,  however,  may  seem  to  afford 
but  cold  comfort.  What  most  people  will  want  to 
know  is  how  the  individual  would  be  practically 
situated  if,  in  a  case  of  conflict  of  loyalties,  his 
decision  ran  counter  to  that  of  the  coordinating 
organization  of  Society.  I  believe  that  the  position 
of  the  individual  would  be  greatly  more  favorable 
than  it  is,  or  can  be,  under  State  Sovereignty  or 
any  unitary  form  of  Sovereignty,  or,  in  other  words, 
than  it  can  be  under  any  system  in  which  the  su- 
preme social  authority  is  vested  in  a  single  body  or 
association.  In  this  case  at  least,  there  is  "safety  in 

1  Definition  before  the  event,  of  course.  The  objection  to 
the  retrospective  creation  of  offenses  holds  good  all  the  more 
if  this  view  is  accepted. 


LIBERTY  191 

numbers,"  and  hope  for  the  individual  in  the  balance 
of  functional  associations  in  Society.  Unitary  the- 
ories of  Sovereignty,  or  the  existence  in  fact  of 
Societies  in  which  one  association  is  supreme,  are 
invitations  to  tyranny,  because  they  are  based  upon 
the  inclusion  of  all  the  individuals  in  a  single  or- 
ganization. If  the  Sovereign  State  is  the  represen- 
tative of  everybody,  the  individual  is  manifestly 
less  than  the  Sovereign  State  which  claims,  by  virtue 
of  its  superiority,  a  right  to  do  with  and  to  him 
what  it  pleases — in  the  interests  of  all  or  the  whole, 
bien  entendu. 

But,  under  a  functional  system,  each  individual 
is  a  member  of  many  associations,  and  each  has 
upon  him  only  a  limited  claim — limited  by  its  so- 
cial function.  The  position  of  the  individual  as  the 
source  and  sustaining  spirit  of  every  association  is 
therefore  clear,  and  the  associations  show  plainly  as 
only  partial  expressions  and  extensions  of  the  will 
of  the  individual.  They  have  thus  no  superiority 
over  him,  and  their  claim  is  limited  to  what  he 
surrenders  to  them  for  the  performance  of  their 
functions. 

Will  not  a  Society  based  upon  these  principles  be 
likely  to  be  far  less  prone  to  tyranny  than  any  other 
sort  of  Society?  It  must  be  remembered  that  the 
functional  character  of  all  its  associations  will  make 
them  far  more  truly  representative,  and  therefore 
far  more  likely  to  sustain  the  will  to  liberty  among 
their  members.  The  best  guarantee  of  personal 
liberty  that  can  exist  is  in  the  existence,  in  each 
form  of  association,  of  an  alert  democracy,  keenly 
critical  of  every  attempt  of  the  elected  person  and 


192  SOCIAL  THEORY 

the  official  to  pass  beyond  his  representative  func- 
tion. In  a  Society  made  up  of  a  multiplicity  of 
such  associations,  there  would  be  less  reason  than  in 
any  other  that  is  practically  possible  for  the  emer- 
gence of  tyranny  and  the  submergence  of  personal 
liberty  beneath  the  weight  of  social  organization. 
The  safeguards  are  not  absolute;  but  they  are  as 
good  as  we  can  hope  for  at  present.  The  func- 
tional organization  of  Society  contains  in  itself  the 
guarantee  of  the  recognition  of  the  fact  that  Society 
is  based  upon  the  individuals,  exists  in  and  for  the 
individuals,  and  can  never  transcend  the  wills  of  the 
individuals  who  compose  it. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  ATROPHY   OF   INSTITUTIONS 

THERE  is  always  a  danger  attendant  upon  theo- 
retical studies  of  presenting  as  static  and  at 
rest  what  is  essentially  dynamic  and  in  mo- 
tion. This  risk  is  peculiarly  great  in  the  domain  of 
social  theory;  for  it  is  difficult  to  refrain  from  hard- 
ening universal  principles,  or  principles  which  at 
least  seem  to  be  universal,  into  precepts,  and  from 
claiming  the  same  universality  for  the  precept  as 
for  the  principle,  Utopias  are  almost  always  un- 
satisfactory, because  they  almost  always  depict  a 
community  from  which  factors  of  vital  change  and 
development  have  been  eliminated. 

It  is  therefore  of  the  first  importance  that  we 
should  remember  that  neither  the  human  wills 
which  make  Societies  and  communities,  nor  the  ma- 
terial circumstances  upon  which  these  wills  work, 
have  any  but  a  relative  degree  of  permanence.  Ma- 
terial circumstances  alter,  and  their  alteration  com- 
pels men  to  adopt  new  methods  of  living  and  work- 
ing together.  And  on  the  other  hand,  men's  desires 
and  aspirations  change,  and  they  seek  different 
methods  of  cooperation  from  time  to  time  and 
from  place  to  place,  even  if  the  material  conditions 
remain  the  same. 

193 


194.  SOCIAL  THEORY 

There  is,  as  we  have  seen,  a  strong  element  of 
artifice  about  all  forms  of  social  organization.  As- 
sociations are  designed,  more  or  less  deliberately, 
for  the  fulfillment  of  certain  purposes.  Even  cus- 
toms, which  seem  the  most  unconscious  things,  are 
for  the  most  part  only  purposes  become  ''mechani- 
cal" by  force  of  long  habit.  If  will  is  the  basis  of 
Society,  habit  is  certainly  the  cement  which  holds 
its  structure  together. 

This  "force  of  habit,"  which  is  so  powerful  a 
factor  in  the  working  of  Societies,  as  well  as  in  the 
unorganized  social  life  of  communities,  has  two  con- 
trasted aspects.  It  helps  men  to  live  together  in 
Societies  and  communities  without  pushing  their 
constant  disagreements  to  the  point  of  open  con- 
flict; for  men  will  tolerate  calmly  an  evil  (in  their 
eyes)  to  which  they  are  accustomed,  whereas  they 
would  fiercely  resent  and  resist  its  introduction.  The 
influence  of  habit,  thus  checking  the  desire  for  re- 
organization and  change,  causes  changes  for  the 
most  part  to  take  place  gradually  without  any  pro- 
found disturbance  of  the  life  of  the  community,  or 
of  the  structure  of  the  Society  within  it. 

This  is  the  good  side  of  habit,  without  which  the 
stable  existence  of  Society,  and  even  of  the  com- 
munity itself,  would  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible. 
But  habit  has  another  side,  and  here  its  operations 
are  by  no  means  an  unmixed  blessing.  It  not  only 
offers  resistance  to  changes  which  would  imperil 
the  stability  of  Society,  but  often  to  changes  which 
are  necessary  for  its  preservation  and  development. 
It  not  only  prevents  the  primitive  destruction  of 
associations  or  institutions  or  customs  which  incur 


THE  ATROPHY  OF  INSTITUTIONS   195 

a  temporary  unpopularity,  but  helps  to  preserve  as- 
sociations or  institutions  or  customs  which  have  lost 
all  social  utility,  or  which  are  actively  retarding  the 
processes  of  social  development. 

Even  an  individual,  when  he  "changes  his  mind," 
by  casting  off  an  old  belief,  or  prejudice,  or  fruit 
of  bad  reasoning,  does  not  usually  do  so  by  a  quite 
sudden  and  simple  act  of  conversion.  He  ordina- 
rily passes  through  a  period  of  doubt,  and,  if  the 
belief  which  is  being  discarded  has  with  it  a  strong 
force  of  custom  or  habit,  he  will  often  continue  to 
act  on  the  old  belief  until  the  long  process  of  con- 
version is  absolutely  complete,  and  even  after  it  is 
complete  when  his  will  is  not  vigilant  to  prevent 
him  from  doing  so.  Far  more  is  this  the  case  with 
social  changes.  Associations,  institutions  and  cus- 
toms continue  apparently  in  full  force,  not  only 
while  the  faith  of  men  in  their  social  utility  is 
passing  away,  but  even  long  after  it  has  passed 
away.  So  strong  is  the  social  force  of  habit,  not 
only  upon  the  individual,  but  still  more  upon  crowds, 
organized  groups  and  communities. 

It  is  therefore  a  phenomenon  found  in  almost 
every  community  at  almost  every  stage  of  its  de- 
velopment that,  side  by  side  with  fully-grown  asso- 
ciations, institutions  and  customs,  and  with  such 
as  are  beginning  to  grow  and  to  achieve  recognition, 
there  exist  other  associations,  institutions  and  cus- 
toms which  have  lost  their  savor  and  social  utility, 
or,  to  use  a  convenient  phrase,  have  become  atro- 
phied. Moreover,  it  will  often  be  found  that  these 
atrophied  social  phenomena  occupy,  at  any  rate  con- 
ventionally, the  highest  place  in  social  honor,  and 


196  SOCIAL  THEORY 

appear  on  the  surface  as  integral  parts  of  the  struc- 
ture of  Society  and  necessary  bonds  of  commu- 
nity. 

Samuel  Butler,  who  has  stated  far  better  than 
any  one  else  the  social  force  and  character  of  habit 
and  "unconscious  memory,"  made,  in  his  Erewhon 
novels,  the  best  existing  study  of  this  phenomenon 
of  atrophy.  The  "Musical  Banks"  of  Erewhon, 
whatever  their  application  to  our  own  Society,  form 
the  best  possible  example  of  an  atrophied  insti- 
tution, and  the  worship  of  the  goddess  "Ydgrun" 
— more  familiarly  known  in  this  country  as  Mrs. 
Grundy — expresses  the  power  of  habit  over  us 
which  causes  such  survivals.  There  are,  no  doubt, 
extreme  cases;  but  any  one  can  think  of  instances 
in  which  the  social  status  of  a  firmly  and  long-es- 
tablished institution  is  out  of  all  proportion  to  its 
surviving  social  utility. 

This  phenomenon  of  survival  of  the  "shell"  when 
the  function  has  passed  from  it  occurs  principally 
in  the  case  of  those  social  forms  which  we  decided 
to  call  "institutions."  1  It  will  be  remembered  that 
we  there  defined  an  institution  as  "an  idea  which 
is  manifested  concretely  in  some  aspect  of  social 
conduct,  and  which  forms  a  part  of  the  underlying 
assumptions  of  communal  life."  We  also  said  that 
it  may  be  manifested  either  "in  men's  personal  con- 
duct or  relationships  or  through  organized  groups 
or  associations." 

An  institution,  then,  may  be  embodied  in  an  as- 
sociation; but  neither  are  all  institutions  embodied 
in  associations,  nor  do  all  associations  embody 
1  See  Chapter  II.,  pp.  41  ff. 


THE  ATROPHY  OF  INSTITUTIONS   197 

institutions.  An  institution  is  a  social  form,  whether 
it  be  embodied  in  an  association,  or  a  custom  or 
something  else,  which  has  behind  it  a  strong  "force 
of  habit"  based  upon  a  historic  importance  of  func- 
tion. There  are  thus  two  elements  which  go  to  the 
conferring  of  institutional  status.  An  idea  only 
acquires  the  status  of  an  institution  by  perform- 
ing over  a  considerable  period  of  time  an  essen- 
tial social  function,  and  thus  becoming  important 
to  men's  habits  as  well  as  to  their  reasons;  but, 
this  status  once  acquired,  habit  will  usually  out- 
last reason,  and  maintain  the  institution  in  being 
and  in  enjoyment  of  status  after  its  function  has 
ceased  to  exist  or  be  socially  important. 

I  have  said  that  an  association  may  embody,  or 
enjoy  the  status  of,  an  institution,  and  in  the  second 
chapter  I  instanced  States  and  Churches  as  examples 
of  this.  As  we  saw  in  Chapter  II.,  an  association 
is  not  an  institution,  but  it  may  become  the  embodi- 
ment or  social  expression  of  an  institution.  Strictly 
speaking,  it  is  not  "the  State"  that  is  an  institu- 
tion, but  social  order,  of  which  the  State  is  regarded, 
on  the  score  of  certain 'past  services,  as  the  embodi- 
ment— not  "the  Church,"  but  the  Spirit  of  God  on 
earth,  which  the  Church  with  its  apostolic  tradition 
is  regarded  as  expressing.  An  institution  is  always 
at  bottom  an  idea,  a  belief  or  a  commandment, 
and  never  an  actual  thing.  It  attaches  itself  to 
things,  but  it  is  not  identical  with  things. 

This  difference  has  to  be  brought  out  in  order  to 
explain  fully  how  we  manage  at  all  to  rid  ourselves 
of  atrophied  institutions,  or,  as  we  should  now  say, 
atrophied  expressions  of  institutions.  Where  the 


198  SOCIAL  THEORY 

idea  or  belief  itself,  that  is  to  say  the  institution 
itself  becomes  atrophied,  the  force  of  habit  finally 
dies  out,  and  the  institution  passes  away,  perhaps 
long  after  the  usefulness  has  been  outlived.  But 
where  the  idea  or  belief  remains  vital,  but  the  as- 
sociation or  law  or  custom  in  which  it  is  em- 
bodied ceases,  under  altered  conditions,  truly  to  ex- 
press it,  there,  failing  the  adaptation  of  the  associa- 
tion, law  or  custom,  the  idea  which  is  the  real 
"soul"  of  the  institution  transfers  itself  to  some 
other  law  or  custom,  and  the  old  "body"  of  the 
institution  decays  and  finally  disappears.  In  this 
case,  too,  there  is  probably  a  long  period  during 
which,  though  the  soul  has  departed  from  it,  the 
body  of  the  institution  continues  apparently  to  flour- 
ish, and  retains  its  social  status  to  all  outward  seem- 
ing unimpaired.1 

In  our  treatment  of  associations,  we  dwelt  on 
the  fact  that  often,  in  the  history  of  Societies,  the 
same  function  passes  at  different  periods  from  one 
association  to  another.  Thus,  industry  passed  from 
the  Medieval  Guilds  to  the  capitalist  employer,  and 
is  now  passing,  at  least  in  part,  into  the  control 
of  the  Trade  Unions.  But  some  Medieval  Guilds 
still  linger  on  in  the  atrophied  form  of  Livery  Com- 
panies, and,  when  Capitalism  has  ceased  to  exist, 
certainly  if  there  is  no  violent  revolution,  and  prob- 
ably even  if  there  is,  atrophied  survivals  of  capital- 
ist association  will  continue  in  existence. 

1  Foreign  observers  often  mistake  such  atrophied  bodies 
of  institutions  for  the  real  soul  of  a  people.  The  pre- 
revolutionary  legend  of  Russia,  as  told  for  example  by 
Mr.  Stephen  Graham,  furnishes  a  good  example. 


THE  ATROPHY  OF  INSTITUTIONS   199 

In  the  sphere  of  social  organization,  it  is  pro- 
foundly true  that 

"Each  age  is  a  dream  that  is  dying. 
And  one  that  is  coming  to  birth." 

For  the  associations,  customs,  laws  and  conven- 
tions among  which  we  live  are  a  queer  mixture  of 
obsolete  and  obsolescent  survivals  from  the  past, 
with  other  social  forms  "in  the  prime  of  life,"  and 
yet  others  which  are  only  beginning  to  assume  the 
true  social  shape  of  their  maturity.  The  social 
prophet  is  not  he  who  builds  Utopias  out  of  his  own 
imagination,  but  he  who  can  see  in  these  rising  as- 
sociations, in  these  laws  which  are  "precedents," 
and  in  these  forming  habits  the  signs  of  the  future, 
and  can  rightly  say  whither  they  are  tending  or 
what  social  functions  they  can  be  made  to  serve. 
The  soundest  part  of  the  Marxian  philosophy  is  that 
which  inculcates  the  lesson  that  the  structure  of  a 
new  social  order  must  be  built  up  within  the  old 
while  it  is  still  in  being,  and  that  the  face  of  Society 
can  only  be  changed  when  new  associations  and 
ways  of  life  have  been  created  within  the  fabric  of 
the  old  in  readiness  to  take  its  place. 

It  is  true  that  this  doctrine  appears  in  Marxism 
coupled  with  the  deadening  determinism  which  viti- 
ates the  whole  system.  The  appearance  of  the  new 
forms  within  the  old  is  made  to  appear  as  some- 
thing inevitable,  and  not  as  the  product  of  will 
and  effort.  Even  as  we  followed  Samuel  Butler  in 
applying  to  social  theory  his  doctrine  of  habit,  we 
may  follow  him  here  in  applying  his  doctrine  of 
evolution.  Let  us  be,  as  he  would  have  said,  La- 


200  SOCIAL  THEORY 

marckians  rather  than  Darwinians  in  our  theory 
of  social  development.  We  need  not  deny  or  mini- 
mize the  vast  influence  of  material  conditions  in 
causing  social  changes  and  directing  the  course  of 
social  development ;  but  we  can  still  believe  that  the 
creation  of  new  social  forms  for  old,  and  still  more 
the  right  direction  and  utilization  of  those  new  so- 
cial forms  which  arise  out  of  changing  material 
conditions,  is  a  matter  which  human  wills  can  in- 
fluence and  which  indeed  depend  essentially  upon 
men's  active  will  to  take  advantage  of  their  oppor- 
tunities. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

CONCLUSION 

THE  foregoing  chapters  embody  an  attempt  to 
state,  in  the  smallest  possible  compass,  the 
essential  principles  of  social  organization. 
Their  primary  concern  has  been  not  with  the  ac- 
tual associations  which  exist  in  the  community,  nor 
with  any  attempt  at  classifying  the  various  forms 
of  association,  but  with  the  moral  and  psychologi- 
cal problems  underlying  social  organization  in  its 
actual  and  possible  forms  among  men  and  in  com- 
munities like  our  own.  This  limitation  is  neces- 
sary, because  it  may  be  that  there  are  peoples  and 
communities  so  different  from  our  own  that  the 
generalizations  which  we  make  for  ourselves  out 
of  our  own  experience  simply  do  not  apply  to  them, 
or  apply  only  with  changes  so  fundamental  as  to  be 
incalculable  by  us.  In  Western  Europe,  the  con- 
ditions, psychological  and  material,  which  under- 
lie social  organization  are  homogeneous  enough  to 
admit  of  generalizations  that  possess  a  real  content. 
But  I  should  hesitate  to  apply  even  to  Russia  gen- 
eralizations based  on  West  European  study  and 
experience,  and  still  less  should  I  venture  to  apply 
them  to  the  civilizations  of  the  East.  It  musi 

201 


202  SOCIAL  THEORY 

be  enough  for  us  if  we  can  make  a  social  theory 
which  will  explain  our  own  communities,  and  help 
us  to  bring  them,  in  their  structure  and  function- 
ing, into  a  more  real  harmony  with  the  wills  of 
the  men  and  women  of  whom  they  are  com- 
posed. 

There  are  many  persons,  considering  themselves 
as  practically-minded,  who  scorn  altogether  the  sort 
of  social  theory  with  which  this  book  is  concerned. 
In  their  eyes,  social  and  political  practice  is  a  mass 
of  expedients,  devised  to  overcome  particular  dif- 
ficulties, and  not  derivable  from  any  philosophic 
theory  of  Society.  You  can,  they  hold,  usefully 
classify  and  arrange  for  future  reference  these  vari- 
ous expedients;  you  can  makfc  lists  of  the  forms  of 
social  organization,  and  study,  by  the  method  of 
comparison,  the  actual  expedients  employed  in  vari- 
ous communities.  But  they  hold  that  it  is  useless 
to  attempt,  from  the  study  of  these  expedients,  to 
discover  universal  principles,  or  to  pretend  to  find 
in  them  the  working  of  certain  universal  ideas  of 
human  association. 

That  the  actual  structure  of  existing  Societies 
is  to  a  great  extent  made  up  of  political  and  so- 
cial expedients  devised,  with  no  theoretic  arriere- 
pensee,  to  meet  particular  problems,  I  most  fully 
agree ;  but  it  has  been  part  of  my  purpose  to  show 
that  these  expedients,  both  in  their  successes  and 
still  more  in  their  failures,  clearly  reveal  the  work- 
ing of  the  universal  principles  upon  which  the  main 
stress  has  been  laid.  The  clash  between  the  actual 
structure  of  present-day  communities  and  the  gen- 
eral principles  which  govern  success  in  social  or- 


CONCLUSION  203 

ganization  is  manifest  in  every  aspect  of  the  com- 
munal life  to-day — not  only  in  that  organized  part 
of  it  which  we  have  called  Society,  but  in  its 
reaction  upon  the  unorganized  parts  of  the  lives 
of  the  men  and  women  who  are  the  members  of 
the  community.  Society  to-day  is,  indeed,  a 
"big,  booming,  buzzing  confusion,"  and  it  will  con- 
tinue to  be  impossible  to  clear  this  confusion  away 
until  we  realize  that  its  causes  lie  in  our  ignora- 
tion  of  the  most  essential  conditions  of  successful 
association — the  principles  of  democratic  functional 
organization  and  democratic  representation  accord- 
ing to  function. 

While  we  recognize,  however,  that  much  of  the 
malaise  of  communities  to-day  arises  from  the  fail- 
ure of  their  leaders  to  grasp  and  apply  these  funda- 
mental principles,  it  is  equally  essential  to  under- 
stand that  these  principles  themselves  are  not  the 
inventions  of  the  theorist  or  social  philosopher,  but 
are,  however  imperfectly,  at  work  everywhere 
around  us  in  Society.  Everywhere  men's  striving 
to  find  expression  for  their  social  purposes  leads 
them  to  base  their  action  upon  these  principles,  and 
everywhere  they  find  themselves  thwarted  by  actual 
forms  of  organization  which  run  directly  counter 
to  them,  either  because  of  the  atrophy  of  a  once 
useful  form  or  because  some  vested  interest  has  in- 
terfered so  as  to  cause  a  perversion  or  opposition  of 
function  among  essential  forms  of  association.  So- 
ciety is  everywhere  the  scene  of  conflict  between 
the  spontaneous  outbursts  of  the  principle  of  func- 
tional democracy  and  the  resistance  of  established 
associations  and  institutions  which  are  either  based 


204  SOCIAL  THEORY 

upon,  or  have  come  to  stand  for,  a  perversion  of 
social  function. 

In  these  circumstances,  it  is  natural  that  the  true 
principles  of  social  organization  usually  find  their 
purest  expression  in  the  associations  of  revolt. 
There  is  a  tendency,  in  some  degree  inevitable,  of 
things  established  and  powerful  to  deteriorate  and 
suffer  perversion,  and,  in  any  Society,  the  recall 
to  sanity  will  largely  come  from  those  spontaneous 
groupings  which  form  themselves  in  opposition  to 
the  groups  in  power.  This  tendency  would  exist 
even  in  the  most  perfectly  organized  community; 
but  it  is  greatly  intensified  in  the  communities  of 
to-day  by  the  almost  complete  absence  of  any  func- 
tional principle 'in  tne  groups  which  at  present  hold 
the  recognized  forms  of  social  power.  The  prom- 
ise of  the  Society  of  to-morrow  is  in  the  revolts  of 
to-day. 

I  have  tried  to  make  as  clear  as  possible  through- 
out this  book  that  human  Society  is  neither  a  mech- 
anism nor  an  organism.  It  is  not  a  machine  which 
we  can  invent  and  put  together  at  will  in  the  meas- 
ure of  our  collective  capacity;  and  still  less  is  it  a 
thing  that  grows  without  being  made  by  our  wills. 
We  cannot  describe  .its  processes  of  growth  and 
change  in  terms  of  any  other  body  of  knowledge, 
natural  or  unnatural.  It  has  a  method  and  proc- 
esses of  its  own.  Thus,  a  group  of  men  living  to- 
gether in  some  particular  relation  within  a  com- 
munity needs  something.  There  may  be  a  dozen 
different  ways  in  which  the  need  can  be  met.  Per- 
haps no  one  devises  a  way  of  meeting  it,  and  in 
that  case  the  need  goes  unsatisfied.  Perhaps,  on  the 


CONCLUSION  205 

other  hand,  some  on  r  the  group  as  a  whole, 
finds,  or  stumbles  up^n,  a  way  either  of  creating 
some  new  organization  to  supply  the  need,  or  of 
adapting  an  existing  organization  to  deal  with  it. 
More  or  less  successfully,  the  necessary  steps  are 
taken,  and  a  new  social  development  is  inaugurated. 
This  development  would  not  take  place  without  the 
need  being  more  or  less  clearly  present — that  is  the 
material  or  environmental  basis  of  social  organiza- 
tion. But  neither  would  the  development  take  place 
unless  human  wills  devised  a  way  of  meeting  the 
need — that  is  its  human  or  psychological  basis. 
This,  however,  is  only  the  first  stage  in  the  de- 
velopment. The  new,  or  re-created,  organization 
arises  to  meet  a  need ;  but  it  not  only  more  or  less 
perfectly  meets  the  need,  but  also  exerts  an  influ- 
ence on  the  other  organizations  which  exist  side  by 
side  with  it  in  the  community.  It  has  therefore  next 
to  find  its  proper  place  in  the  general  structure  of 
Society  and  in  the  community  as  a  whole.  As  an 
actual  organization,  it  presents  itself  as  a  fact  of 
which  Society  has  to  take  account.  Here,  again, 
the  factor  of  human  will  comes  into  play.  There 
may  be  a  dozen  different  ways,  of  varying  merit, 
of  assigning  to  the  new  organization  its  place  and 
recognition  in  Society.  Perhaps  none  of  these  ways, 
or  a  bad  way,  is  adopted.  In  that  case,  the  new 
organization  acts  as  a  disruptive  force  in  Society, 
and  may,  if  it  is  strong  enough,  end  by  tearing  the 
social  structure  asunder,  and  compelling  a  funda- 
mental reconstruction.  Or,  on  the  other  hand,  it 
may  be  itself  destroyed,  even  if  it  is  performing 
a  useful  function  in  Society.  Perhaps,  however, 


206  SOCIAL  THEORY 

a  reasonable  way  is  found  of  fitting  the  new  or- 
ganization into  the  social  structure.  In  that  case, 
the  new  organization  enters  into  the  structure  of 
Society,  and  in  doing  so  both  modifies  Society  as  a 
whole  and  is  itself  modified.  These  are  the  nor- 
mal and  peculiar  processes  of  social  development. 

I  am  laboring  this  point  in  order  to  make  it  clear 
that  important  social  changes  are  usually  inaugu- 
rated in  the  parts  and  not  in  the  whole  of  Society, 
and  often  nearer  to  its  circumference  than  to  its 
center.  It  is  usually  difficult,  and  often  impossible, 
to  foresee  in  the  early  stages  of  such  a  process  as 
I  have  described  the  nature  or  extent  of  the  social 
change  that  is  really  beginning.  The  best  social 
prophet  and  the  best  constructive  statesman  are 
those  who  have  most  the  power  of  divining,  among 
the  many  new  movements  and  associations  which 
are  constantly  arising  and  among  the  old  ones  which 
are  constantly  undergoing  modification  to  suit  new 
needs,  those  particular  organizations  which  are  most 
likely  to  effect  large  changes  in  the  whole  struc- 
ture of  Society. 

This  may  seem  a  truism;  but  it  has  a  moral 
which  is  not  so  generally  recognized.  "Keep  your 
eye  on  the  new  movements  and  organizations,  and 
always  estimate  them  in  accordance  less  with  what 
they  actually  are  than  with  what  they  seem  capable 
of  becoming"  is  the  first  maxim  of  social  wisdom. 
Big  social  changes  are  seldom,  if  ever,  created  or  at 
least  maintained,  unless  the  impetus  to  change  has 
behind  it  the  force  of  an  organized  group  or  asso- 
ciation based  on  a  vital  common  need.  In  the  wel- 
ter of  revolution,  the  power  to  build  a  new  or- 


CONCLUSION  207 

der  will  belong  to  those  who  have  behind  them  the 
most  coherent  form  of  social  organization,  the  form 
best  fitted  among  those  available  to  replace  the  old 
order  and  provide  for  the  effective  fulfillment  of 
vital  social  functions.  It  is  the  possession  by  the 
working-class  movements  of  such  strong  and  pur- 
poseful forms  of  organization  as  Trade  Unionism 
and  Cooperation  that  makes  their  inheritance  of 
the  task  of  reconstructing  Society  almost  cer- 
tain. 

No  doubt,  it  will  be  said  that  this  conviction 
of  the  coming  of  a  new  order,  called  into  being 
largely  as  a  result  of  the  emergence  of  the  new 
forms  of  social  power  which  these  working-class 
movements  represent,  has  colored  much  of  the  writ- 
ing contained  in  this  book.  Of  course  it  has  done 
so.  It  is  the  business  of  the  theorist  to  interpret 
in  terms  of  ideas  the  actual  forces  and  tendencies 
by  which  he  is  surrounded.  Any  one  with  the 
smallest  degree  of  social  vision  can  see  that  the 
existing  structure  of  Society  is  doomed  either  to 
ignominious  collapse  or  to  radical  transformation. 
Any  one  ought  to  be  able  to  see  that  the  social  the- 
ories based  upon  this  structure  are  bound  to  share 
its  fate.  Theory  which  is  content  merely  to  inter- 
pret the  established  order  will  inevitably  misinter- 
pret ;  for  the  truth  about  the  established  order  is  only 
visible  when  that  order  is  confronted  with  its  suc- 
cessor growing  up  within  itself.  Theory  ought  to 
get  ahead  of  actual  development;  for  the  chief 
value  of  theory  lies  in  helping  men  to  act  more 
intelligently  in  the  present  by  giving  them  a  power 
to  grasp  the  principles  which  must  go  to  make  the 


208  SOCIAL  THEORY 

future.  These  principles — any  social  principles — 
are,  of  course,  only  true  upon  certain  assumptions; 
and  I  have  not  hesitated  to  make  certain  assump- 
tions the  basis  on  which  the  whole  theory  of  this 
book  is  built.  What  are  these  assumptions? 

I  assume  that  the  object  of  social  organization 
is  not  merely  material  efficiency,  but  also  essentially 
the  'fullest  self-expression  of  all  the  members.  I 
assume  that  self-expression  involves  self-govern- 
ment, and  that  we  ought  to  aim  not  merely  at  giv- 
ing people  votes,  but  at  calling  forth  their  full  par- 
ticipation in  the  common  direction  of  the  affairs  of 
the  community. 

If  any  one  questions  these  assumptions,  there  is 
no  way  of  proving  them  either  true  or  untrue.  If 
it  is  contended  that  men  only  ask  for  peace  and 
quietness,  and  do  not  want  to  govern  themselves, 
I  answer  in  the  first  place  that  this  is  not  true, 
and,  secondly,  that,  if  it  were  true,  we  ought  not 
to  acquiesce  in  such  a  state  of  affairs,  but  to  alter 
it  as  speedily  as  possible.  In  short,  it  has  been 
assumed  throughout  this  book  that  human  beings 
have  wills,  and  that  they  have  a  right  and  duty 
to  use  those  wills  to  their  full  capacity  in  the  di- 
rection of  Society.  These,  I  think,  are  my  only  as- 
sumptions. For  the  rest,  the  arguments  used  to 
prove  each  point  may  be  sound  or  they  may  be 
unsound.  No  doubt  they  are  mixed;  but  my  ob- 
ject has  been  not  to  achieve  finality  or  write  a 
definitive  book,  but  to  set  others  to  work  upon 
problems  which  I  have  only  raised.  The  time  for 
a  new  and  definitive  social  theory  is  not  yet;  but 
it  is  high  time  for  our  generation  to  set  about  lay- 


CONCLUSION  209 

ing  the  foundations  of  a  theory  more  responsive  to 
modern  development  than  that  which  at  present 
holds  sway.  Orthodox  social  theory  is  bankrupt: 
it  neither  corresponds  to  the  facts  of  to-day,  nor 
affords  any  help  in  interpreting  the  tendencies  which 
are  shaping  a  new  social  order  within  the  old.  There 
are  already,  in  the  writings  of  such  men  as  Mait- 
land,  Figgis,  and  the  Guild  Socialists,  some  of  the 
elements  necessary  to  a  new  theory;  and  my  main 
object  has  been  to  express  what  seem  to  me  the 
essential  principles  of  this  theory,  certainly  not  in 
a  final,  but,  I  hope,  in  an  intelligible  form,  in  or- 
der that,  even  if  they  are  not  accepted,  they  may  at 
least  be  criticised  and  discussed. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTES 

THERE  is,  of  course,  an  immense  literature  dealing  with 
social  and  political  theory  in  its  various  aspects  and  from 
different  points  of  view.  These  notes  are  not  intended  to 
do  more  than  indicate  a  few  of  the  books  which  I  have 
found  most  useful,  by  way  either  of  attraction  or  of 
repulsion,  in  forming  my  own  view.  The  list  could  be 
indefinitely  prolonged. 


(A.)     GENERAL 

MACIVER,  R.  M. — Community,  a  Sociological  Study.  (Mac- 
millan.) 

[This  is  by  far  the  best  general  book  I  know.  It 
is  especially  useful  on  the  nature  of  community  and 
for  the  study  of  associations.] 

>r  ROUSSEAU,  J.  J. — Social  Contract  and  Discourses,  edited 
and  translated  by  G.  D.  H.  Cole.     (Dent.) 

[Rousseau's  Social  Contract  remains  by  far  the 
greatest  and  most  stimulating  study  of  the  basis  of 
social  obligation.] 

BARKER,  E. — Political  Thought  from  Herbert  Spencer  to 
the  Present  Day.     (Williams  &  Norgate.) 

[A  useful  introductory  study.] 

BURNS,    C.    DELISLEL — Political   Ideals.      (Oxford   Uni- 
versity Press.) 

[A  short  study  of  the  historical  development  of 
political  ideals.] 

210 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

(B.)  SPECIAL 
CHAPTER  I 

v    WALLAS,  GRAHAM. — Human  Nature  in  Politics.     (Con- 
stable.) 
The  Great  Society.     (Macmillan.) 

LIPPMANN,  WALTER. — A  Preface  to  Politics.     (Mitchell 
Kennerley.) 

BROWN,  W.  JETHRO. — The  Principles  Underlying  Modern 
Legislation.     ( Murray. ) 

RITCHIE,  D.  G.— Natural  Rights.     (G.  Allen  &  Unwin.) 
Darwinism  and  Politics.     (G.  Allen  &  Unwin.) 

BOSANQUET,  BERNARD. — The  Philosophical  Theory  of  the 
States.     (Macmillan.) 

ANSON,  SIR  W.  R. — The  Law  and  Custom  of  the  Constitu- 
tion.    (Oxford  University  Press.) 

DICEY,  A.  V. — The  Law  of  the  Constitution.  (Macmillan.) 

POLLOCK,    SIR   F. — History   of  the  Science   of  Politics. 
(Macmillan.) 

JENKS,  EDWARD. — The  State  and  the  Nation.     (Dent.) 

BAGEHOT,  WALTER. — Physics  and  Politics.  (Kegan  Paul.) 
The  English  Constitution.     (Nelson.) 

MACDOUG  ALL,  WILLIAM. — Social  Psychology.    (  Methuen. ) 

MACDONALD,    J.    R. — Socialism    and     Society.       (Inde- 
pendent Labor  Party.) 

CHAPTER  II 
MACIVER,— Op.  cit. 

CHAPTER  III 
v  PLATO. — Republic,  translated  by  A.  D.  Lindsay.     (Dent.) 

BARKER,  E. — The  Political  Thought  of  Plato  and  Aris- 
totle.    (Methuen.) 

DE  MAEZTU,  RAMIRO. — Authority,  Liberty  and  Function. 
(G.  Allen  &  Unwin.) 


212  SOCIAL  THEORY 

HOBSON,    S.    G.,    and   ORAGE,    A.    R. — National    Guilds. 

(Bell.) 

COLE,  G.  D.  H. — Self -Government  in  Industry.     (Bell.) 
Labor  in  the  Commonwealth.     (Headley.) 

CHAPTER  IV 

MACIVER. — Op.  cit. 

V  GIERKE,  O. — Political  Theories  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
edited  with  an  Introduction  by  F.  W.  Maitland.  (Cam- 
bridge University  Press.) 

CHAPTER  V  AND  CHAPTER  VIII 

LASKI,  H.  J. — Studies  in  the  Problem  of  Sovereignty. 
(Oxford  University  Press.) 

Authority  in  the  Modern  State.     (Oxford  Univer- 
sity Press.) 

BOSANQUET,   B. Op.  Cit. 

HOB  HOUSE,  L.  T. — The  Metaphysical  Theory  of  the  State. 

(G.  Allen  &  Unwin.) 
PAUL,  WILLIAM. — The  State:  its  Origin  and  Function. 

(Socialist  Labor  Press.) 
COLE,  G.  D.  H.— Op.  cit. 

BROWN,   W.   JETHRO. — The  Austinian   Theory  of  Law. 
(John  Murray.) 

CHAPTER  VI-VII 

ROUSSEAU. — Op.  cit. 

MICH  ELS,  R. — Democracy  and  the  Organisation  of  Po- 
litical Parties. 
BELLOC,   HILAIRE,   and   CHESTERTON,   CECIL. — The  Party 

y         System.     (Swift.) 
MILL,  J.  S. — Representative  Government. 

CHAPTER  IX 

MARX,  KARL. — Capital.    3  volumes. 
>/ and  ENGELS,  F. — The  Communist  Manifesto. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

PAUL,  WILLIAM. — Op.  cit. 
HOBSON  and  ORAGE. — Op.  cit. 
COLE.— Op.  cit. 

CHAPTER  X 

FAWCETT,  C.  B. — The    Natural    Divisions    of    England. 
(Royal  Geographical  Society.) 

The  Provinces  of  England.     (Williams  &  Norgate.) 

BRUN,  CHARLES. — Le  Regionalisme. 


CHAPTER  XI 
FIGGIS,  J.  N. — Churches  in  the  Modern  State.  (Longmans.) 

ROBERTS,  R. — The  Church  in  the  Commonwealth.    (Head- 
ley.) 

MARSON,  C.  L. — God's  Co-operative  Society.  (Longmans.) 

Report  of  the  Archbishops'  Committee  on  Church  and 
State. 

CHAPTER  XII 

RUSSELL,  BERTRAND. — Roads  to  Freedom.     (G.  Allen  & 
Unwin. ) 

Principles  of  Social  Reconstruction.     (G.  Allen  & 

Unwin.) 

*/  MILL,  J.  S.—  Liberty. 

CECIL,  LORD  HUGH. — Liberty  and  Authority.     (Edward 
Arnold.) 

CHAPTER  XIII 

"^BUTLER,  SAMUEL. — Erewhon.     (Fifield.) 
Life  and  Habit.     (Fifield.) 

WARD,  JAMES. — Heredity  and  Memory.    (Cambridge  Uni- 
versity Press.) 


INDEX 


Action,  relation  to  organiza- 
tion, 33 

Ad  hoc  organization,  99  f.,  168 
Administration,  113,  162,  See 
also  Government 

—  regional,  166 
A.  E.,  35 

Air  Force,  141 

Amalgamation,  58 

American  social  theory,  19 

Analogies,  use  of,  14 

Anarchy,  181 

Anthropology,    18 

Areas,  158  ff. 

Army,  42,  141,  142 

Associations,  5,  7,  9,  n,  14, 
17,  25,  26,  30,  34,  35-6,  53, 
Chap.  IV.,  104,  125,  206 

—  administrative,  72,  74 

—  appetitive,  68-9,  134  f. 

—  coercion  in,  128 

—  definition  of,  32  ff.,  37 

—  development  of,  56 

—  diseases  of,  18 

—  "essential,"  65  ff.,  74,  75  ff., 

134  f. 

—  forms  of,  Chap.  IV. 

—  government     of,     104     ff., 

117  ff. 

—  motives  of,  77  ff. 

—  philanthropy,  71 

—  political,  67,  134.    See  also 

State  and  Local  Govern- 
ment 

—  propagandist,  73-4 

—  provident,  70 

—  relation      to      institutions, 

196  ff. 

—  religious,     70.      See    also 

Churches 

—  rules  of,  40 


Associations,  sociable,  71 

—  theoretical,  71-72 

—  vocational,  68,  72,  97,  134  f ., 

136.       See     also     Trade 

Unions    and    Employers' 

Associations 

Assumptions,  social,  208 
Atrophy,  social,  38,  39,  43  ff., 

75,  Chap.  XIII.,  203 
Austinian   theory  of   law,  5, 

212 
Australia,  164 

Balance  of  Powers,  124-5 
Belloc,  Hilaire,  122,  151,  152, 

212 

"Black  Lists,"  129 
Bolshevism,  10,  61 
Bosanquet,  Bernard,  22,  93, 

211 

British  Empire,  164 
Burke,  Edmund,  22 
Butler,   Samuel,  45,   196,  199, 
213 

Cabinet  system,  the,  108,  122 

Canada,  164 

Capitalism,  42,  147  ff.,  198 

Caste,  42 

Catholicism,  Roman,  89,  172 

Charity  organization,  70 

Chesterton,  Cecil,  122,  212 

Chesterton,  G.  K.,  160 

Children,  130 

Church   and    State,    138,   172, 

177 

—  of  England,  172 
Churches,  9,  10,  18,  22,  38,  42, 

61,   70,   73,   76,    101,    129, 
Chap.  XL 

—  as  institutions,  197 


215 


216 


SOCIAL  THEORY 


Churches,  Free,  172 
City,  27 

State,  86,  95,  107 

Clan,  the,  12 
Class-dictatorship,  88 

discrimination,  87 

privilege,  87 

war,  150,  152,  155,  171 

Classes,  economic,  153 

—  social,  87  f . 
Clubs,  71 

Coal    Industry    Commission, 

159 

Coercion,  case  against,  139  ff. 
Coercive  power,  5,  126-7, 

Chap.  VIII.,  186,  189  f. 
Collectivism,  86,  98,  152 
Colvin,  Ian,  54 
Committees,  121 
Communism,  10,  69,  152 
Community,  22,  97 

—  definition  of,  25-6 

—  relation  to  State,  64 

—  spirit  of,  35,  120,  169 
Companies,  limited,  36,  68,  73 

—  Livery,  43-4,  198 
Company  law,  88 
Conflicting  Social  Obligations, 

141 
Consent  as  basis  of   society, 

91,  "3 

Conservatism,  44 
Consular  service,  84 
Consumers,   organization   of, 

69,  98  ff . 

Control  of  Industry,  153,  198 
Cooperative  Societies,  73,  207 
Coordination,  88,  101,  Chap. 

VIII.,  167  f.,  176  ff.,  183, 

189 
Corporate  bodies,  position  of, 

6 

County  Councils,  170 
Coventry,  sending  to,  129 
Cox.  R.  W.  T.,  152 
Crowd  psychology,  18 
Custom,  5,  25,  41,  44,  45,  195 

—  definition  of,  45 

—  relation  to  institutions,  45 


Darwinism,  200 

Decentralization,  164 

Delegate  versus  representa- 
tive, 109  ff. 

Delegation,  118 

Democracy,  9,  90,  Chap.  VI., 
160.  See  also  Functional 
Organization 

Despotism,  90 

Devolution,  161  f. 

Direct  action,  60 

Divine  Right  of  Kings,  8,  90 

Domestic  system  in  industry, 

13 

Dominion  Government,  84 
Duckham,  Sir  A.,  159 

Eastern  civilization,  201 
Economic  aspects  of  society, 

37,  59.  64,  72,  98,  Chap. 

IX.,  158 

—  power,  144  ff.,  153  ff. 
Efficiency,  208 
Elasticity,  social,  39 
Elected  persons,  audacity  of, 

105,  121 

Election,  indirect,  167  ff. 
Employers'    associations,    59, 

68,  77.  150,  154,  171 
"End   in  itself,''  23 
Engels,  F.,  144,  147,  212 
Environment,  i,  2,  205 
Equality,  economic,  151,  153, 

156,  186-7 
Erewhon,  196,  213 
Establishment,  the,   173 
Ethics,     relation     to     social 

theory,  7,  14,  20,  49 
Europe,  Western,  201 
Executive  power,  123 

Factory  Acts,  83 
Family,  u  ff.,  26,  64 

—  analogy  from,  13 
Federal  Governments,  84 

—  organization,  134  ff .,  164 
Figgis,  J.  N.,  10,  209,  213 
Filmer,  Sir  R.,  13 

Free  will,  183 


INDEX 


Friendly  Societies,  70,  73 
Function,  confusion  of,  57  ff. 

—  in    relation    to    individual, 

48-9 

—  opposition  of,  57-9 

—  perversion    of,    57-9,    60-2, 

122  ff.,  145,  148,  156,  184, 
203 
Functional  Equity,  Court  of, 

137  ff- 

—  organization,  9,    10,    Chap. 

III.,  79,   107,   125,   130  ff., 
134  ff.,    154,    162  ff.,    194, 
203,  207 
Functions,  demarcation  of,  55 

Geddes,  Patrick,  160 
General    Will,    23,    51.     See 

Will  as  Basis  of  Society 
Gierke,  Otto,  n,  212 
Government,  Chap.  VII. 

—  Dominion,  84,  164 

—  federal,  84,  164 
Governments,    common    will 

of,  120 

—  tendency  to  deteriorate,  19, 

120 

Graham,  Stephen,  198 
Groups,  temporary,  40 
Grundy,  Mrs.,  196 
Guild  Socialism,  10,  140,  152, 

209 
Guilds,  medieval,  43,  64,  85, 

198 

Habit,  104  ff. 

Hegel,  22 

History,   constitutional,   18 

—  ecclesiastical,  18 

—  materialist    conception    of, 

146,  152 

—  relation    to    social   theory, 

IT  f. 

Hobbes,  8 

Hobhouse,  L.  T.,  93,  212 
Hungary,  65 

Individual,  49-50 

—  relation  to  society,  4,  5,  62 


Individual,  unorganizable  as- 
pects of,  31,  139,  160,  179, 
i8p  ff.  See  also  Personal 
Rights 

Industrial  Revolution,  85,  147 

—  self-government,  10 
Innovation,  method  of  social, 

204  f.,  206  f. 
Institutions,  25,  30,  44 

—  atrophy   of,   Chap.    XIII. 

—  definition  of,  41,  43,  196  f. 

—  relation     to     associations, 

196  ff. 
Insurance  Companies,  70 

—  mutual,  70 

—  State,  84 
"Interests,"  52 
International  social  structure, 

46,  88  ff.,  141 
Ireland,  28,  30-1,  35 

Joint    Council   of    functional 

bodies,  135  ff. 
Judiciary,  123,  137 

Kant.  183 

Labor  in  the  Commonwealth, 

141,  143,  212 
Labor  legislation,  84 

—  Research  Department,  159 
Lamarckism,  200 

Law,  6,  8,  n,  15,  18,  19,  20, 
123,  137,  164,  198.  See 
also  Lynch  Law 

—  Roman,  n 

—  Society,  129 
Leadership,  in 

League  of   Nations,  89,   141, 

143 

Learned  societies,  71-2 
Legislation,  Chap.  VII.,  186 

—  commercial,  84 

—  functional,    125  ff. 
—  labor,  83-84 

Liberty.  Chap.  XII.  See  also 
Personal  Rights  and  In- 
dividual 


218 


SOCIAL  THEORY 


Liberty,  personal,  184 

—  social,  182  f . 

"Life  and  Liberty"  movement, 

70,  173 
Local  Government,  5,  67,  77, 

84  f.,  87,  Chap.  X. 

—  English,  164 

Local  patriotism,  160,  169  f. 
Locke,  John,  83 
Lords,  House  of,  136 
Loyalties,  conflict  of,  27,  140, 

189 
Lynch  law,  130 

Maitland,    F.     W.,     n,    209, 

212 
Majorities,  apathetic,  22 

—  tyranny  of,   188  f . 
Mai-distribution,  153,  186 
Mann,  J.  E.  F.,  152 
Marriage,  42,  43,  45,  87 
Marx,  144,  145,  147,  212 
Marxism,    10,    148,    149,    151, 

153,    156,    162,  ^199 
Materialist  conception  of  his- 
tory, 146,  152 
Mechanical  theory  of  society, 

14,  21,  204 

Medical  Council,  General,  129 
Mercantile  System,  85 
Michels,  R.,  18,  122,  212 
Middle  Ages,   10,  43,  64,  85, 

138,  147.  172 
Militarism,  142 
Milner,  Dennis,  85 
Mining,  97,  159 
Minorities,  conscious,  57 

—  dissentient,  22 
Misrepresentation,    107,    108, 

159  f. 

Monarchy,  42,  43 
Monogamy,  42 
Montesquieu,  18,  19 
Manning  Post,  54 
Motives,  "associative,"  77,  135 

—  "several,"   77 

—  social,  18.  Chap.  IV. 
Municipal  trading,  84 
Musical  Banks,  196 


Napoleon    of    Netting    Hill, 

The,  160 
Nation,  26,  46,  95 

—  -State,  86,  95 
"National  Guildsmen,"  88 
Navy,  42,  141,  142 

New  Age,  88 
"New  Heptarchy,"  166 
Non-adult  races,  130 
Non-unionism,  129 

Officials,  104  ff.,  118 
Oligarchy,  9 

One  man  one  vote,  114-115 
Orders  in  Council,  124 
Organic  theory  of  society,  14, 

21,  204 
Organization,  a  necessary  evil, 

185-6 

Osborne  Judgment,  39 
Ostrogorski,  18 
"Other-worldliness,"  174 

Papacy,  the,  172 

Parliament,  68,  108,  114,  119, 
124,  150,  167 

Party  System,  122 

Paul,  William,  148.  212 

Peasant  proprietorship,  151 

Peerage,  42,  43 

Penty,  A.  J.,  160 

Persona  ficta,  n 

Personal  rights,  87,  101,  131, 
139,  181  ff.  See  also  In- 
dividual and  Liberty. 

"Personality,"  social,  14,  15 

Physiology,  2O 

Plato,  48,  211 

Plutocracy,  108 

Police,  137 

—  Union,  9 

Political  activities,  definition 
of.  86 

—  organization,     168-9.       See 

also     State     and     Local 
Government. 

relation     to     economic, 

144  ff.,  176 

—  parties,  26,  41,  68,  73 


INDEX 


219 


Political  activities,  theory,  4, 

9,  156 
Primitive    civilization,    11-12, 

1 8,  29,  64,  147 
Profits,  58 
Proportional    Representation, 

167 

Provincial  Home  Rule,  166 
Psychology,  14 

—  physiological,  20 

—  social,    10,    15,    18,    19,    2O, 

21 

Public  utility  services,  158  f . 
Purposes,  individual,  33.   See 

also  Wants  and  Motives 

—  social,  25,  33,  38,  52,  53-4. 

See  also  Wants  and  Mo- 
tives 

Recall,  in,  167 
Referendum,  118,  133-4 
Regionalism,  85,  Chap.  X. 
Religious  disputes,  150-1 
Representation,     Chap.     VI., 
159  f.,  191 

—  functional,  100,  105  ff.,  119. 

See  also  Functional  Or- 
ganization 

Representative  Government, 
18,  103  ff.,  114,  ii7ff., 
123  ff. 

—  or  delegate,  109 
Republics,  43 

Research,  industrial,  72,  84 
"Reunion  all  round,"  175 
Revolt  as  form  of  progress, 

204 

Revolution,  60-1,  94,  198,  206 
-  English,  83 

Rights,  personal.  See  Per- 
sonal 

—  political,  94 

Rousseau,  6,  19,  20,  21,  22,  23, 

51.  105,  120,  133,  210 
Rousseau's  Emile,  20 
Rules,  associative,  40 

—  ethical,  40 

Russell,  Bertrand,  140,  213 
Russia,  61,  65,  198,  201 


Schools,  2 
Science,  13 
Second  Chamber,  vocational, 

136 

Selection,  social,  54 
Self-government,  case  for,  208 
Self -Government  in  Industry, 

loo,  123,  135,  212 
Sex  relationships,  86-87 
Sievers,  N.  J.,  152 
Social  content  of  action,  7 

—  contract,  8 

—  theory,  scope  of,  3,  7,  8,  17, 

202  ff. 

Social  theory,  method  of,  14 
Socialism,  international,  89 
Society,  25,  66 

—  as  mechanism,  14,  21,  204 

—  as  organism,  14,  21,  204 

—  as  person,  14 

— -correlation  of  organiza- 
tions in,  204  ff.  See  also 
Coordination 

—  definition  of,  29 
Sociology,  18 
Sovereignty,  10,  102,  126,  133, 

140.  143,  145,  162,  190 
Soviets,   I2i 

Spencer,  Herbert,  21,  180 
"State,  The."  4,  5,  10,  18,  22, 

29,  42,  64,  67,  69,  73,  Chap. 

V,  112.  119,  183,  188 

—  and  Individual,  4,  9,  Chap. 

XII.   See  also  Individual 

—  and  society,  6 

—  as  association,  81,  95 

—  as  coercive  power,   128  ff., 

131  ff.,  145-6 

—  as  compulsory  association, 

94 

—  as  territorial  association,  95 

—  bonus  scheme,  85 

—  coordinating    activities    of, 

88,  101  ff. 

—  economic  activities  of,  83 

ff..  97  ff- 

—  employees,  84 

—  external    relations   of,   88, 

141  f . 


220 


SOCIAL  THEORY 


"State,    The,"    functions    of, 
m  82  ff.,  96  ff.,  136 

—  in  industry,  84 

—  members  of,  93-4 

—  political  activities  of,  86  ff., 

100  f. 

—  Socialism.     See    Collectiv- 

ism 

—  structure  of,  go  ff. 
States,  actual,  16 

—  democratic,  91-2 

—  joint  action  of,  89. 

—  modern,  82 
Strikes,  60,  145 
Struggle  for  bread,  152-3 

—  for  power,  153 
Subjects,  93 
Suffrage,  universal,  95 
Syndicalism,  10,  152 

Taxation,  85 

Terminology  of  social  theory, 

16,  23,  Chap.  II. 
Theory,  value  of,  207  f. 
Town-planning,  160 
Trade  Union  law,  88 

—  Unions,  2,  9,  26,  39,  41,  59, 

60,  68,  70,  73,  77,  79,  95, 
101,  124,  128,  147,  150, 
155,  171,  198,  207 


Tribe,  29 
Trusts,  84,  159 

Universitas,  177 
University,  2,  26 
Utopias,  193,  199 

Votes,  94,  115-6,  118-9,  208 

Wallas,  Graham,  19,  211 
Wants,  "associative,"  34,  77 

—  "several,"  34,  77 

—  social,  33,  204-5.    See  also 

Motives  and  Purposes 
War,   141  ff. 
Ward,  James,  45,  213 
Webb,  S.  and  B.,  159 
Whitman,  Walt,  105 
Will,  as  basis  of  society,  6,  7, 

8,  22,  103,  193,  200,  204 

—  General,  23,  51 
"Will"  of  association,  22 

—  'real,'  91,  92-3,  188 
Women,  2,  5 

World  community,  26,  142 

Ydgrun,  196 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW. 


JUN131968 


Y 


50wi-3,'68(H924288)94S2 


2  2 JAN  14107 


DC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000813704     4 


